'Your future' | ByHeart blog

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Your future, optimised

What if you could direct the future?

Would you like to have a direct line to your future?

Wouldn't it be fun to be able to ask your future self how it all works out?

In this post, I'm going to describe a couple of ways you can play with the future:

'Leaping over the mountain' , a Taoist technique for reaching into the future.
A variation that allows you to think-back-from-the-future.

YOU ARE ALREADY GREAT AT THIS

Before we begin, in case you hesitate at the idea of playing with the future in this way, here's a reminder that you are doing this already.

You are already constantly running simulations of potential futures - although you may be running more worst-case scenarios than spectacularly-wonderful ones.

Whenever you run these simulations, you automatically generate / draw from them the emotions (and body chemistry) that go with the scenario you're playing out. For this reason, it is just as well to run AT LEAST AS MANY advantageous and favourable to you scenarios as you do anxious ones.

The instructions below activate your future-probing skills, and only change the direction of your probing into potential futures, making it more conscious and deliberate.

LEAPING OVER THE MOUNTAIN

Photo by Joshua Ness on Unsplash

The steps are straightforward:

RELAX. Get comfortable, close your eyes. Draw a few slow breaths, so your mind disengages from what has just been happening and settles into 'neutral gear'.
Use your imagination as a VIRTUAL-REALITY FACILITY. Imagine yourself having arrived into your implausibly-great outcome. This is not about what it would take to get there. In fact, I suggest you ignore the 'How?' question completely. Play 'as if': it's as if you've just leapt over all the obstacles, the entire mountain of them, and are standing there, in that future, with everything having worked out implausibly well. The reason you're doing this is that it triggers your subconscious mind to give you access to lots of information you won't have had direct access to before.
IMMERSE yourself in this future. You want to gather lots of sensory information about this moment, this setting. You can work through the senses systematically (sight, hearing, smell, etc.), or you can allow your imagination to roam at will. You need to gather enough detail that you could film a short clip about this place and this moment - the setting, where you are, time of day, time of year, what you are doing, who you are with, how you feel inside, what you can hear in the background or what soundtrack might suit this moment. Allow yourself to 'bathe' in this glorious moment.
Give this future your APPROVAL and PERMISSION. We are often so concerned and preoccupied with the obstacles that we forget to grant permission for things to work out. This is the moment for you to say something like 'Yes, this would be tremendous, I would love for this moment to actually come to pass!'
Grant yourself frequent visiting rights. If this is a future you like the look/sound/smell of, you could hang out here as often as you like. It is here for you whenever you want or need it.

THINK BACK FROM THE FUTURE

Photo by Brooke Cagle on Unsplash

This variation is an elaboration on the 'Leaping over the mountain' procedure. This time, you can bring back more tangible information about the path that leads to that implausibly-wonderful outcome.

The sequence begins the same way:

RELAX. Get comfortable, close your eyes. Draw a few slow breaths, so your mind disengages from what has just been happening and settles into 'neutral gear'.
Imagine yourself having arrived into your implausibly-great outcome. Allow yourself to marvel that it has all worked out so well!
How did you accomplish this? From the place where it has all worked out, glance behind you to find out a bit more about the HOW. What did you tackle first? What help did you get along the way? The very questions you've been mulling over - ask them from here.
Receive whatever revelations turn up, small or large, even the tiniest new notion of something you could try. Embrace these - and embrace that more help/insights may well turn up along the way.
Take back with you anything you find useful or uplifting as you guide yourself back into the everyday reality of sitting in your chair etc.

May the future bestow wonderful surprises on you at regular intervals.

If you give either of these a go, I'd love to hear how it goes for you.

If you like the sound of using your imagination to tap into your greater potental, I'd be happy to help.

Drop me a line!

The future is for you to make

Your future is uncharted.

More than that, your future cannot be chartered. It is too fluid for that - more like the sea than the dry land.

Your future is not determined by your past, or some pre-scripted destiny.

It is for you to make.

Your contribution matters.

ABOUT THE AUTHOR: Margarita Steinberg

I am a Leadership Coach with a specialism in Psychosynthesis psychology. I am the founder of ByHeart Coaching, and this blog grows out of my coaching work. I am also a qualified and experienced teacher, and draw on training in counselling skills.

I work with individuals and couples, as private clients; I also work with organisations through running leadership coaching programmes and group workshops.

PUBLICATIONS
A chapter on my innovative learning format using embodied learning appears in the book 'Disrupting traditional pedagogy: Active Learning in Practice' published by University of Sussex Press in June 2019.

In preparation: my first book 'One step at a time: how to thrive in a dynamic world'

Find out more about my work

Coaching with Psychosynthesis | ByHeart Coaching

Coaching with Psychosynthesis psychology is a powerful path to your goals | ByHeart Coaching with Margarita Steinberg

Coaching with Psychosynthesis | ByHeart Coaching

Coaching with Psychosynthesis psychology is a powerful path to your goals | ByHeart Coaching with Margarita Steinberg

How It Works | ByHeart Coaching

ByHeart's Six-Step Process for individuals and couples

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