subject: Creating a Winning Self-image – Change Self-image, Change your Life [print this page] Creating a Winning Self-image Change Self-image, Change your Life
"The ''self-image'' is the key to human personality and human behavior. Change the self image and you change the personality and the behavior." Dr. Maxwell Maltz
It would be almost impossible to overstate the importance of the self-image. It molded our personality, defined our character, and it directs our behavior. The self-image is the way that we perceive ourselves to be. It defines how we behave, it sets the boundaries of what's possible for us and it shapes the way that we present ourselves to the world.
The self-image is responsible for the quality of life that we'll enjoy or the lack thereof. For all these reasons and many more, our self-image is of capital importance. Every possible effort should be made to have the best possible self-image.
Before we attempt to change the self-image, it must be understood that the self-image is a personal belief and nothing else. It is not something that we were born with or that is inscribed in our genes or DNA. As far as the self-image is concerned, we were born with a clean slate that we filled by accepting suggestions that were given by parents, friends, teacher and peers and through some personal observations.
We were the ones who accepted those suggestions and made those observations so, even if were not consciously aware that we were accepting those suggestions, we must take full responsibility for the process.
Changes are only possible by taking responsibility for what concerns us. No change is ever possible by taking on the victim stance. The reason for that is simple. We have control over what we created or have allowed to be created in our brain but if we adopt the beliefs that it was due to outside influences, there is little if anything that we can do to change it.
Once we have accepted responsibility for our self-image, the second thing that has to be done is to write down what that image is. It is impossible to try to change some vague notion. Just as we would not try to redecorate the inside of a house that we have not seen, it would be foolish to attempt to change a self-image of which we only have some vague concepts.
Formulating the description of our self-image demands some introspection. The best way to do that is by sitting down and writing a paragraph describing who we perceive ourselves to be. That paragraph is simply a rough draft. It won't be perfect and we should not even try to make it perfect.
However, in days to come, that draft has to be reviewed and corrected until we have an accurate description of what we perceive ourselves to be. It may take days and it may take weeks but the exercise should be done until we are satisfied with the finished product.
Once that this is done, we must define and write down what we believe that we could be if we were all that we could be. That is our ideal self-image. That's the image that we want to fill; that's the person that we want to become. That's how we want to see ourselves it's our new and improved self-image.
We now come to the final stage of the exercise. That ideal self-image must be placed where it can easily be seen and read over and over again with conviction until it is completely believed and accepted.
People who have tried this technique were amazed at the results that were achieved in a relatively short period of time. Every time that the ideal self-image is read, it reinforce the belief and eventually turns it into a conviction. That's the power of autosuggestion. It's the ideal tool to change a negative self-image into the glorious image of what we fundamentally are.
