I have an active imagination, & am lucky enough to find visualising something in my mind quite easily. I say lucky enough, but there’s also the downside that I can really visualise all the things that can go wrong! Whether you actually see the images in your mind, or you can think through all the things that can go wrong, many of us can stay in the catastrophising mindset.
I thought catastrophising was something that I ‘should stop doing’, that the Law Of Attraction meant I would bring those things into my life. But we can use that ability to visualise what could go wrong in a more structured way to our benefit. And when we do, we can actually find more freedom from the catastrophising. It’s like we’ve had a good listen to it, learned from it, so it no longer has the same power.
The Worst Case Scenario I use is akin to what might also be known as a Negative Visualisation. And in Maya Raschoora’s book “Visualise - Think, Feel, Perform, Like The Top 1%” she gives some great examples of their use:
“Michael Phelps…imagined every possible scenario that could go wrong - his goggles filling up with water, losing his breath or falling behind everyone else….. Michael’s goggles did fill up with water & he decided to swim 75% of the race blind….not only did he win, but he also got a new world record.” That was at the 2008 Olympics for the 200m butterfly final.
“Alex Honnold, the American free solo climber, was the first person to climb El Capitan without ropes or other safety equipment…He would visualise every possible way he could die…Not only did this motivate him to keep going, but it also gave him the chance to prepare for the worst.”
“Leading psychologist Gary Klein designed…a ‘Pre Mortem’. Before a project starts, the CEO or manager should ask the team to envision the project failing, seeing everything that’s going to go wrong…being prepared for the obstacles that will undoubtedly come your way.”
And lastly, we can go back to 300BCE, where “it was the single most valuable technique in the Stoics’ psychological toolkit because it helped to reduce fear & enhance appreciation.”
We don’t need to be a high performing athlete or CEO to use these. I’ve found my Worst Case Scenario Visualisations are great when either trying to make a decision, or when I’ve made a decision, but am delaying taking action.
I’ll give you an example of a decision that I’d been delaying taking action on, that I have taken through my Worst Case Scenario Visualisation in the last week. I’ve been planning to launch my new Founder Group Coaching Circle for a while. The ideas, the framework, the topics, the purpose, the feel, the logistics, are all either in progress or there. And ok, some other big life things have happened in the last year that have focused my attention elsewhere. But I was conscious I was still delaying taking actions.
So I sat down, cup of tea in hand, journal & pen at the ready.
I wrote out exactly what the decision & actions were that I was delaying. I ran it through the Visualisation, I saw what could go wrong, lots of versions of what could go wrong, I identified how I was feeling, what the fear was, what the limiting belief was (that old nugget of: ‘I’m not good enough’). But then the really important part as I stepped into my powerful, confident self; I visualised how I would handle those things going wrong, what support I would call in, and how I would feel then. I tapped into the belief & the purpose behind why I was doing it. I felt certainty on the decision, & certainty on the actions to take. And also that I was capable & excited to get on with it.
I also came away with strategies & tweaks to what I was planning to do, which will help me handle the things that don’t go as I might like, & even more useful, ways to feel less overwhelmed & stressed if things do go wrong.
Even writing this now, I can feel that excitement & belief in my decision bubbling up.
That’s just one example, so here’s a little list of types of decisions you could take through these types of Visualisations:
Whether to have that difficult conversation with a partner, friend, child, neighbour, colleague?
Whether to take up that new hobby, or sign up for that new class, whether it’s a book club, art class, wild swimming, or yoga….?
Whether to apply for that job, go for that promotion, to leave corporate life?
Big decisions like whether to buy that house, choose a school for your child, get a new puppy!
In your business; launching a new offering, or making a change to how you or the business do things, whether it’s your sales approach to internal organisations structures & systems. Whether to appoint that new employee?
Or, saying yes to telling people about your new business, your side hustle, your new idea.
Now it might logically make sense that if we visualise what could go wrong, we can then make plans for how to handle those eventualities. That in itself is super helpful.
But I like to go deeper as I visualise, to also bring in sounds, smells, tastes, and importantly what it feels like. As Dr Tara Swart says in her book; ‘The Source, Open Your Mind. Change Your Life; “Visualisations should harness all of our senses, tapping into an imagined & ‘felt’ experience of them. You will be able to conjure a full sensory experience by creating the feel, sound, & scent as well as the visual image of your imagining”.
And in a Worst Case Scenario Visualisation by tapping into the full sensory imagery & the feelings, we can find the fear. We look to identify what we are afraid of, and from there we might gain insight into what the limiting belief is. So that we can then reframe those in our minds, and come away with how we’ll feel once we’ve handled it, & what belief about ourselves will carry us through it with more ease.
And when it comes to taking the action; well our brain has already seen us handle it once or multiple times, so when it comes to it, we feel more capable. Remember our brains don’t know the difference between something visualised & something we do. So from our brain’s perspective when you take that action, you’ve done it before & handled it.
So a Worst Case Scenario Visualisation isn’t about staying in a loop catastrophising, it’s a structured way to see the scenarios, to tap into the fear and belief that’s holding you back (without lingering in it), to step into your powerful confident self & see yourself handle the scenarios, and come out the other side. Leaving with clarity & in my case a belief about myself that enables me to move forward with more ease.
If you’d like to join me for a Worst Case Scenario Visualisations, head over to my Visualisation page to book onto the online live Visualisation Session on 3rd September 8.30pm (London). And you get the recording after to use for 30 days so you can take other decisions through it as you’d like.
Let’s let go of catastrophising & use our wonderful brains to make our decision & act.