The Power Of Visualisation

If you can see it and believe it, you can achieve it...

- Werner Beukes

Visualisation has been used for many years as a valuable tool to gain a competitive edge. Head-strong Mr. Olympia winners of the past such as Ronnie Coleman, Dorian Yates and Arnold Schwarzenegger all used the power of visualisation with great success. These champions actually never lifted a barbell without having a sharp picture of what they were trying to accomplish in their head. It was as if they used their subconscious brain as a self-guided missile. When they fired it off it started moving towards its programmed target.

Arnold even applied visualisation to specific body parts: “I pictured my biceps growing like huge mountains as I worked them.” Mental imagery techniques contributed to the final product on contest day, with visualisation an intrinsic part of the success of these bodybuilding icons, who at one point or another monopolised professional bodybuilding’s greatest trophy.

DISMISSED AS NONSENSE

Visualisation is often mistakenly dismissed as nonsense by the ignorant, but evidence through the years has proven over and over again that the ability of an athlete to visualise a positive outcome is an important predictor to the achievement of goals. It's like creating a self-fulfilling prophecy.