How healthy is your vision of yourself? How does your mental image of yourself stack up against that of, say, some hero of yours? Let’s find out.

Take a few seconds and picture yourself in your mind’s eye. Now imagine a hero of yours in same setting. Did your vision have to “shift” a little? A lot perhaps? Is your posture, both internal and external, as strong and confident as that of your hero? If not, you might want to read on.

If you suffer from insecurities, doubts, or shaky self-esteem, you have plenty of company. Actually, every one of us falls prey to these at some time or another in varying degrees.

And no wonder! Just about every form of media is constantly and relentlessly pelting us with messages of our inadequacies. We’re not sexy enough or fit enough or sophisticated enough. We sorely lack this thing or that thing. We’re just plain not good enough way we are. Baloney!

Not surprisingly, we need to be as constant and relentless in our efforts to feed our minds positive messages. This is only way we can expect to counteract and overpower negative messages we get on a regular, ongoing basis. Makes sense, yes?

Now, writing out our goals every day is a great beginning. However, we also need to be able to envision ourselves enjoying these goals. If our minds cannot handle concept of success, even if we were to stumble onto a fortune, our impoverished self-image would soon separate us from any form of riches.

There are plenty of stories out there about people who have won lottery, only to find themselves as poor as ever after a short period of time. These people actually managed to squander or otherwise lose all their wealth in order for their circumstances to once again match their impoverished identities!

I couldn’t believe this first time I heard such a story, but there have been many more since. I figured that a guy would have to be a complete idiot in order to allow such a thing to happen. I have since concluded that it has little to do with intelligence. It is simply that people in question were not mentally equipped to accept abundance.

Okay, ready? I want you to think of a big, mean dog. He’s baring his teeth and growling at you. He looks like he’s about to pounce on you. There’s nothing standing between you and him. Take your time and make him look as ferocious and dangerous as possible. Okay, stop! Forget about that dog for a moment.

Instead, I want you to picture a cute little puppy. Picture him clearly now. This little guy is as friendly as they come. He is wagging his tail and wiggling toward you, anxious for you to rub his belly and scratch his ears. Aw, isn’t that sweet?

Now, let’s look at what happened here. First you saw in your mind’s eye a vicious dog. I would bet that your mind furnished all sorts of details, such as color, size, type, etc. Your imagination didn’t need to be given instructions. It went to work automatically.

Now, how did you feel with this picture in your mind? Tense? Did you clench your jaw? Or perhaps your breathing became very shallow or stopped altogether for a few moments.

Then, when I instructed you to envision a friendly puppy, again your mind concocted all details. What was your reaction this time? Did you smile? Did you chuckle softly to yourself?

I’d like to point out two things. First, neither of those pictures existed anywhere in your immediate reality. They were both simply figments of your imagination. Nonetheless, images you created were no doubt vivid. And more importantly, your reactions, physical, psychological and emotional, were all quite real.

Second, you were able to switch mental pictures completely and what’s more, you did it in a flash. Exactly HOW did you accomplish this? Do you know? Well, I don’t know either, but that doesn’t alter fact that you are, indeed, capable of conjuring up whatever you want, whenever you want, complete with as many details as you want. This is quite an astonishing feat!

There’s no trick to it really. It’s just natural capacity of mind that you were born with. Can you believe that your mind has such phenomenal power? And you, and only you, have final say as to which pictures you allow to linger in your mind. You control master switch!