PUSH: Persevere Until Success Happens Through Prayer (14 page)

The lack of understanding of the power of imagination is largely responsible for the suffering, difficulties, failures, and unhappiness people experience in the world. For some reason, most people are inclined to think negatively. They do not expect success. They expect the worst, and when they fail they believe that fate is against them. When this attitude is changed, when a person’s imagination and expectations change, then life will improve accordingly.

I read a profound and dramatic story of an Air Force colonel who was a prisoner of war held in a Vietnamese prison for seven mentally and emotionally exhausting years. Every day this man played a full game of golf in his imagination. Exactly one week after he was released from his ordeal, he entered the Greater New Orleans Open and shot a seventy-six, which is an amazing score for a man who hadn’t picked up a club in all of those years. This story illustrates the basic principle of harnessing your imagination—in other words, acting as if that which you perceive is real and already accomplished. I am not talking about pretending here, but about living and acting as if what you desire has already occurred. The problem with most people is that they dwell on what they don’t have at the expense of what they can have.

You are not required to accept your life as it is. You do not have to accept your present circumstances but can live the life of your most daring dreams. In one of my favorite books of the Bible, Jesus tells a man who had been lame for thirty-eight years to take up his bed and walk (John 5). To me his bed represented the thirty-eight years he went to sleep and dreamed of a better life. You do not have to be limited to only dreams of a better life, but you can take up your bed and walk them out here and now.

Everything in the universe, every progress of humanity, every scientific advancement evolved from someone’s imagination. The Book of Genesis shares many stories of the incredible power of imagination. In Genesis 13 we read of Abraham receiving the following instruction from the Lord:

Lift your eyes now and look from the place where you are—northward, southward, eastward, and westward; for all the land which you see I give to you and your descendants forever…. Arise, walk in the land through its length and its width, for I give it to you
(Genesis 13:14-17).

Abraham did not physically walk through its length and its width. He used his imagination to do so. God was simply saying he must have a clear vision of his future in order for it to come to pass. Abraham had to take responsibility in order to energize and materialize it with the power of his own imagination.

Where you find yourself ten years from now will be the direct result of your imagination. Visualize exactly where you want to be. Focus on what you want, not on what you don’t want. Imagine the best
you
living your best life, doing your best work for God. You can do the same thing with your finances, your relationships, your marriage, or your business. Your imagination will influence every area of your life, for better or for worse. Don’t imagine how terribly you could fail; dare to imagine how much you can achieve. In Genesis 11:6 God remarked,
“Nothing will be restrained from them, which they have imagined to do”
(KJV).

You must dare to imagine a fabulous future, one in which all your dreams come true. Charge your imagination with emotions and fuel it with action. Put yourself where you see yourself. Dare to go there. Arnold Schwarzenegger, five-time Mr. Universe and four-time Mr. Olympia, stated, “I visualized myself being there already, having achieved the goals already. It’s mind over matter.”
⁵⁷

As an exercise, think of anything about your life you would like to change or enhance. Sit back, relax, close your eyes, and fantasize about what you would really like to occur. Don’t put any limitations on it and don’t shroud it with doubt. Remember, there is no one who is going to judge this fantasy and no one who is going to prevent it from happening. Only you have the power to inhibit its realization. If it is healing in your body, then imagine yourself as you felt during your healthiest hour. Embrace that awareness and relive it as a real occurrence in the now. Henry David Thoreau said, “The world is but a canvas to the imagination.”

In his book,
Stumbling on Happiness
, Daniel Gilbert wrote:

To see is to experience the world as it is, to remember is to experience the world as it was, but to imagine, ah, to imagine is to experience the world as it isn’t and has never been, but as it might be. The greatest achievement of the human brain is its ability to imagine objects and episodes that do not exist in the realm of the real, and it is this ability that allows us to think about the future. As one philosopher noted, the human brain is an “anticipation machine,” and “making future” is the most important function.
⁵⁸

The power of using visualization to create and invent can be demonstrated by the early experiences of Nikola Tesla. At a young age, Tesla began training his powers of imagination through actively visualizing his ideas. In his autobiography,
My Inventions
, Tesla wrote, “I observed to my delight that I could visualize with the greatest facility. I needed no models, drawings, or experiments. I could picture them all as real in my mind.”
⁵⁹
He further explained:

I gave myself up entirely to the intense enjoyment of picturing machines and devising new forms. It was a mental state of happiness about as complete as I have ever known in life. Ideas came in an uninterrupted stream and the only difficulty I had was to hold them fast.
⁶⁰

Tesla was a prolific and unparalleled genius without whom we might not have the advancements in radio, auto ignition, transmission, telephone, or television that we have today.

Never underestimate the power of your imagination. In the famous words of the legendary Napoleon Hill, “Whatever the mind of man can conceive, and believe, it can achieve.”

Strip yourselves of your former nature [put off and discard your old unrenewed self] which characterized your previous manner of life and becomes corrupt through lusts and desires that spring from delusion; and be constantly renewed in the spirit of your mind [having a fresh mental and spiritual attitude], and put on the new nature
(the regenerate self)
created in God’s image, [Godlike] in true righteousness and holiness.
—E
PHESIANS
4:22-24 AMP

I discovered I always have choices and sometimes it’s only a choice of attitude.
—J
UDITH
M. K
NOWLTON

T
here once was a woman who, after taking chemotherapy, woke up one morning, looked in the mirror, and noticed she had only four strands of hair left. She said, “I know what I will do; I will wear two pig tails.” She did and had a fantastic day. The next morning she awakened to find only three hairs on her head. “Well,” she said, “I think I’ll braid my hair today!” So she did and she had another wonderful day. The next day she woke up, looked in the mirror, and saw that she had only two hairs on her head. “Hmm,” she said, “I think I’ll part my hair down the middle today.” So she did and she had a grand day.

The next day she woke up, looked in the mirror, and noticed that she had only one hair on her head. “Well,” she said, “today I’m going to wear my hair in a pony tail.” So she did and she had a fun, fun day. The next day she woke up, just grateful to be alive, looked in the mirror and noticed that there wasn’t a single hair on her head. “Hooray!” she exclaimed. “I don’t have to fix my hair today!” Well, the chemotherapy was successful, and it was only a year later that she looked into the same mirror at a full head of hair and thought, “It looks like I am going to have another beautiful day!”

Her story encouraged me as I wrote this chapter and reminded me that my happiness, joy, and peace are incubated and cultivated by my own attitude. Seldom considered, attitude does more to influence every area of our life than any other single thing. Attitude determines our altitude. It dictates how successful and, ultimately, how happy we will be. It not only controls how we handle life’s challenges, but it also determines how we feel when we get up in the morning and the state of our being before we go to bed at night. It controls what we eat and drink, which ultimately determines the state of our health. And attitude, without a doubt, controls the health of our relationships.

Attitude controls the gate of creativity in your mind, the thoughts that you allow your mind to entertain, and the ideas that are cultivated resulting in products and services you can eventually convert into wealth. Attitude can make you happy or sad, loving or hateful, cheerful or remorseful, attractive or repulsive. Your attitude controls your very capacity and predisposition for success and prosperity.

Very few people claim full and total responsibility for the state of their lives, but instead give their personal powers and creative juices away by blaming the problems they face in life on the shortcomings of others, the state of the economy, their spouse, their boss, their domestic conditions, and any combination of a million other reasons they can conjure up in their minds. Or worse, the imagined shortcomings, they are convinced, exist in themselves. Do not allow yourself to be seduced into this destiny-altering state. Harness your personal power and God-given ability to engineer your own destiny by consciously controlling your attitude.

When you fully consider the impact your attitude has on your thoughts, perceptions, and actions, and the moment you become mindful of the awesome power that God has placed within you, you won’t want to allow negative attitudes to sabotage your happiness, health, and success any longer. You will begin to nurture and groom your attitude and put it to positive use. It is a tool, a weapon, a treasure, and a contagion. Your attitude is more contagious than the most prolific disease ever faced by humankind. Its influence affects and impacts everything and everyone you come into contact with. It is a blessing you can share in any situation.

Your attitude determines the highs and lows of your life. It not only increases or decreases your emotional bank account but also the emotional assets of those around you. The state of your attitude determines the quality of your life. It colors your world. Groomed and nurtured in a positive manner, there will be no person or obstacle that can stand in the way of your success or fail to be impacted for the better.

I heard of a story about an elderly carpenter who was ready to retire. He told his employer of his plans to leave the house building business and live a more leisurely life with his wife and family. He would miss the paycheck, but he needed to retire. The contractor was sorry to see his good worker go and asked if he could build just one more house as a personal favor. The carpenter said he would, but in time it was easy to see that his heart was not in his work. He resorted to shoddy workmanship and used inferior materials. It was an unfortunate way to end his career. When the carpenter finished his work and the builder came to inspect the house, the employer handed the front-door key to the carpenter, saying, “This is your house. It is my gift to you.”

What a shock! And what a shame! If he had only known he was building his own house he would have had a different attitude and done it all so differently. Now he had to live in the home he had built so sloppily.

So it is with us. We build our lives in a distracted way, reacting rather than acting, willing to tolerate less than the best. At important turning points and defining moments, we do not always put forth our best effort. Then, with a shock, we look at the situation we have created and find that we are now living in the house we have built. Many of us look back with regret. If we had only realized that every action we took or neglected to take in the past affected our future, we would have acted much differently. Think of yourself as the carpenter and your life as your house. Each day you hammer a nail, place a board, or erect a wall with your attitude. Build wisely, for it is the only life you will ever build.
⁶¹

How could this be illustrated more clearly? Your life today is the result of your attitudes and choices. Take full and total responsibility for your attitude toward life, people, circumstances, and opportunities, because the reality you experience tomorrow will be the result of how you handled that responsibility today. With the right attitude, you can overcome all of the limits and obstacles set before you and live the life of your dreams.

If you serve Christ with this attitude, you will please God, and others will approve of you, too.
—R
OMANS
14:18 NLT

Let us therefore, as many as are perfect, have this attitude; and if in anything you have a different attitude, God will reveal that also to you.
—P
HILIPPIANS
3:15 NASB

L
ife is full of ambiguities. You often hear the question asked, “Is the glass half empty or half full?” as a metaphorical guide regarding how we look at life and perceive our realities. For indeed our perception is our reality. Jesus, when speaking to His disciples, simplifies for us how perception shapes and molds our lives. He said that our model for this is a child. The following story gives further insight into the principle of childlikeness.

One day, the father of a very wealthy family sent his son on a trip to the country with the express purpose of teaching him how poor people live. The young man spent a couple of days and nights on the farm of what would be considered a very poor family.