How Visualization & NLP Works
- 3 examples of how everyone does visualize – and you do too!
- How well do you control your imagined pictures?
- In what contexts of life is visualization essential?
Everyone does visualize / imagine / see pictures in their head. When you were 6 weeks young, you started smiling at your mother. You did this by matching a picture in your head with the picture of the person looking at you. You might also recognise her voice or smell, but if she put on a wig, you would cry! That is visual recognition.
If your friend walked into the room now, would you recognize him/her? Now imagine the same person with pink hair. Did you change your picture? Now imagine you are watching a car driving up to the red traffic light. Imagine it stopping. Imagine the movie going in reverse.
This is how you control the pictures that you imagine. You are born with this skill. But in some cases a person gets under stress and the brain gets confused and loses this skill or starts applying it wrongly. And that’s how learning difficulties start to happen.
Now make sure that you see images
- easily, sharply, and clearly
- far enough to be comfortable, yet near enough to be easy to see
- as movies or as still pictures, whichever you need in any given moment.
In what contexts of life is visualization essential?
- A hairstylist needs to see what a haircut will look like before starting it.
- A taxi driver must picture where s/he is going.
- A double glazer, construction worker, carpenter sees the finished item.
- An architect imagines the finished building and then draws up the plans.
- An artist imagines what s/he is creating.
- A surveyor must see whether the building matches the plans.
- A student visualizes mind maps, sequences, formulae, equations, materials for revisions and exams.