Lesson 1: Change

 

 

Changing who we are is difficult -- and many of us give up, over, and over again. Science and psychology haven’t always provided a succinct and clear path on how to change, and how to sustain that change, but it is possible. Despite the difficulties, the Visualize Personal Success (VPS) model for achieving and living your dreams will provide you with the insights and tools you need to navigate around the challenges and start living your dreams!

 

In this lesson, we start by getting clarity on what you value, what your dreams (dreams and goals are used interchangeably in this course) are, and how you behave. Are your values, dreams and behaviors aligned? The following questions are for reflection AND if you want to grow and change, writing them down will help you grow new neural maps and provide a nudge forward.

 

 

Yellow and orange lights depict a Neural Map of a typical odor sensory system in the human brain in this illustration to the left. Notice there is a pattern or map. It is not random spots. Maps for behaviors, thinking, and feelings are located in distinct regions of the brain. New maps can be developed more easily than old maps being stopped.

 

By dating your reflections, you can come back sometime in the future and see if your answers are the same as they were originally. If they are different, write down the change for future reflection.

 

 

 

 

Each of your habits will have nuances that are unique to you: from chemical dependency to genetics; from the family and social environments you function in each day to your personal beliefs and the values that you live by. Noticing, understanding and honoring your uniqueness is what will bring you success when using VPS.

 

You may have a busy, busy life and may have lost sight of your inner self, the place from which you navigate every interaction every day. The importance of slowing down and re-acquainting yourself with your values, beliefs, and deep feelings cannot be overstated. This is what will make the VPS process successful for you. It is also important to understand your perspective, which forms around your relationship with your own self and with other people. Once you understand your own perspectives, you can change the lens you see yourself through. All of these details about yourself matter.

 

VPS provides the questions to ask and reflect on about yourself. These questions are supported by additional, optional readings about how your brain, genes, social environment, and other factors which may impact you. As you learn more about yourself, increasing your self-awareness, you retain that knowledge, and with that, you can always learn new behaviors. Here are questions for your reflection, write down your answers.

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

Visualize Personal Success (VPS): The circular arrows in the center of the graphic depict revisiting and re-aligning our goals, values and behaviors throughout our life and its impact anywhere from and between our most inner self and our social self. The arrows with “Peers, Friends, Family” illustrate the influence the social systems that we are a part of have on us, and reciprocally, us on them. VPS is dynamic which stillness and awareness help to create.