What on earth does Stephenie Meyer's Twilight Saga of a vampire and a clumsy adolescent girl have to do with your losing weight, or getting along better with your family, let alone feeling happier? More than you may realize. Not a fan? Relax, I'm NOT going to suggest you go see the latest movie, New Moon, but there is something to be learned here from how this story got written.
Twilight began with an image: the star-crossed lovers, lying down in an open field of flowers. (Contrary to popular opinion, Forks, one of the rainiest towns in America, can produce and nurture flowers, so that's not fantasy). That bucolic scene was in the middle of her first book, but the image was compelling enough for Stephenie Meyer to craft her entire 4-book epic and create the saga that has pulled masses of people, both adolescent and adult - mostly female - into America's theaters in search of a good romance. Box-office records were broken. Harry Potter is now a vampire...
Meyer has described during interviews how this image was the seed from which the whole story grew, so what can we learn from this? There is an image that is the seed for your own best life. Images have great power to shape the lives of "ordinary" individuals as well as famous ones: Einstein had the image of riding on a beam of light and it inspired him to develop the theory of relativity. As impressive as that may sound, it isn't restricted to physicists; we all have images.
Stephenie Meyer may be easier than Einstein for most of us to identify with, and speaking of her, here's a confession. Twilight, New Moon, and the rest have been a guilty pleasure, sending me (together with my bemused and understanding wife) on an alien quest along with fellow pilgrims possessing generally shorter vocal cords and no Adam's apple, to view the first two movies nearly as soon as they emerged from their seedpods (the movies, not the audience).
So, what IS an image? It's an internal event, in your mind. It's a summary of a particular future, maybe holding hands with your life partner, seeing the numbers on a bathroom scale, or dancing with your family. Of course, the way many people exercise their ability to create images is to worry, but I don't recommend it unless you really do want that negative experience.
I've suggested visual images, but they don't have to be visual. Maybe it's a voice telling you, "Congratulations." Maybe it's a specific sensation, but there are conditions. It needs to be compelling TO YOU. It also has to be emotional to work. Intellectual and reasonable just don't persuade our insides. If you hooked us up to functional MRIs while in an excited state, you'd notice our amygdala and hypothalamus lighting up like little Christmas trees in our brain. For PC enthusiasts, Chinese lanterns or a menorah might do, but they don't work as well - maybe those chains of firecrackers for the Chinese New Year? Anyway, loosely speaking, those sparkling clumps of color illuminated in our brain scan are the strings of lights associated with emotion. You need that "lighted up" state for an image to pull enough energy to power your efforts, to meet your challenges. You don't need the power to move a mountain. You need "just enough" power. For example, if you're wanting to be fit and healthy, you just need more power than a cookie... (I know they're powerful; fortunately, they don't make Mystic Mints any more. Sometimes the Big Roulette Wheel throws one in our direction)
For Meyer, her creation all started with a single image. The deal is, do you have a compelling image of what you want to create, of your best life? If you don't, you need one. In The Recession-Proof Lifestyle Program (it's free - go sign up if you haven't already) I've described what to do. It's a curious thing. You need to get comfortable with this image of your best life at the same time as it inspires you to move through all the inevitable challenges you'll face in creating it. You could paint it or sing it, or email it or try raising it (not a promising scenario), but the easiest way to develop an image is to create a narrative of your desire - a story. A single internal experience that emotionally and powerfully sums up that narrative is your image. I know most people aren't writers, but you don't have to be! You only need to jot down a rough description of your own success. But, here comes a warning - you'll need a way to hold on to your image, to keep it.
We're generally talking about routines of lifestyle here in this blog, so find an image that's powerful enough to sustain you and your new habits. Find an image that supports both getting AND having your success. This is not rocket science, and it's not relativity - you can do it! Scribble down a description of your best life as though you're telling a friend about what you did last weekend, and remember it needs to support BOTH getting there and being there.
Getting there isn't enough. Being there is equally important. You need to get used to your own best life. Stephenie Meyer got there. She's there now, but if she doesn't have an adequate image of being there - of living out her success - chances are she's going to encounter a lot of rough weather in her new life. Fields of flowers don't do well in rough weather. I wish her luck. I think she can thrive. And so can you.
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