As soon as I am aware that I'm awake, I snuggle my face against my silk pillowcase and I say, I love my silk pillowcase. And then I say, And I love my side-sleeping pillow. And I love my wall mattress toffer. I've created a bit of a haven in my bedroom.

I love this. I'm right there with you. So what else do you love? Let's keep going.

I'm so grateful for my silk duvet. I'm grateful for my mattress. I'm grateful for bedding. Usually, that's the minimum. I might do the temperature in the room or how quiet it is.

Do you say it out loud or do you just say it to yourself?

I say it in my mind. Then I just do some deep breathing in every direction of my chest, like it's a barrel, and just have a feel for if there's any areas of tension. Then to actually get out of bed, I start thinking about how much I'm going to savor my cup of tea. Then I go downstairs and I take my probiotic, because I have to wait 10 minutes until I have my cup of tea. I do my oil pulling, and then I make my cup of English breakfast tea or matcha like a complete ritual and sit and really savor it and enjoy it. Then I pick up my phone and look at my messages.

How does this help you? How does this help your brain?

I think the thing about this gratitude practice that's to do with the tangible things that around me Is that it stops what usually happens to people is that you start thinking, What do I have to do today? What time is it? What am I going to wear today? Because obviously, I don't keep my phone in my bedroom, I can't reach for that and start getting bombarded by the outside world before I've had a chance to set myself up how I want to. There's a lot of scientific evidence for the benefits on your mental health and your health and your longevity of gratitude. Basically, I'm not letting my brain kick in. I'm going straight to the gratitude so I can't even think about anything else. And of course, then that makes me feel good already.

What are other key habits that you have as a neuroscientist throughout the day that continue to help your brain to thrive like this?

I'm going to be really honest with you and say I'd prefer to start by going to the end of the day because those are the real key anchors for me. And I just want to keep it really real and say that there are days where I don't do anything else consciously in the rest of the day. I just live, just do my day. But I will come back to... There are some things, so I will come back to them. But I would say second in importance is the fact that I have my vision board next to my bed, so it's the last thing I look at at night.

Let's talk about the vision board because you called it an action board. Yeah. Why does a vision board work?

I've been doing them for 15 years, and I've manifested a lot of things through my vision board. What?

What have you manifested through a vision board? I'm saying- Dr. Tara.

I started when I quit my job as a medical doctor, and I started my coaching practice. I literally had no money, no clients, got to the point where I wouldn't be able to pay my rent and my bills. At that stage, I did include an actual amount of money that I needed to earn. For the first three years of running my business, I doubled that figure each year. Then after that, I just put symbols of abundance because I didn't need it to be a specific amount. I've manifested a lot of travel, but sometimes spooky. I saw a picture of a tanned girl snorkeling, and I love snorkeling. I put her on my vision board just to have a vacation that was that vacation. I At this point, I was single and I used to go on Christmas vacation holidays with my best friend who lived in Australia. We would often choose where to go because I would see how many air miles I had and say, Oh, I can get a flight to this place. The year that we decided we would meet in Rio, to De Janeiro, was because that was the only flight that I could get with my points.

I suddenly had this inkling that I hadn't been aware of. I went and looked at my vision board, and in Any writing under the Snorkeling Girl, it said Rio de Janeiro. I have so many more examples of things like that as well.

What I also love about this is that you take it a step further and you don't say, What a cool accident. You say, I manifested that. How does a vision board, which you call an action board, program your brain for thriving?

It is a vision board in the sense that most people will know what a vision board is. But the difference is, like I said about quantum physics before I wrote it through cognitive science, did give an idea that you should create this vision, either in your mind or on a board. Often it was quite fantastical compared to what the person's life was actually like. I do believe it's got to be somewhat realistic. Then sit at home on the couch and wait for it to come true. Wait for the check to come in the post. Wait for the dream partner to bang your door down. I just don't believe that that's possible. I believe that you have to be out there doing things to move yourself towards those goals so that the board is simply a reminder to do the selective filtering, selective attention, and value tagging to your brain to keep those things at the front of your mind and not let life get in the way. Because it's so easy to just get busy with kids and work and forget. Not every day, remember what are the things that you want. But if you're seeing the board every day, then it does just help to bring it back to the front of your mind.

Also, some people can't do visualization. Especially for them, actually having the visual images ready to look at allows you to get into that next step, which is visualize it being true. Close your eyes after looking at the board and immerse yourself in the feeling of those things actually being true. You're in Rio de Janeiro, you're with your loving partner, you're doing really well at work. Feel that through your five senses and then give gratitude for the fact, for that feeling of like, wow, with my eyes closed, I can feel that I'm holding my partner's hand and our feet are in the sand in Rio, and we could afford this vacation because we're both doing really well at work.

Because what you're really summoning is that magnetic energy that you talked about. What's actually happening in your body and in your mind When you go through this process of creating a vision board and then visualizing it and allowing the wave of gratitude associated with that happening to fill your body, what happens in your brain?

When you visualize something really strongly and you integrate your senses, your brain can hardly tell the difference between that being true and that being a created feeling by you. Because anything new is the biggest threat to the brain, uncertainty and novelty are the biggest threats to the brain, the more you visualize and embody the thing that you want, the more likely you are to take healthy risks to get it when it appears around you in the real world. So when you're feeling fear or shame or sadness, your blood is circulating a lot more of the stress hormone, cortisol. When you're feeling love and trust and gratitude, you're circulating a lot more of the bonding hormone, oxytocin. Those hormones are on a seesaw. If you're giving gratitude, then you're improving the release of oxytocin, and that's relatively reducing the stress hormone Hormone. Basically, love or gratitude, trust, those sorts of things, can't coexist with fear and shame and sadness. The more you push your brain into those emotions which correlate with that hormone, The less you're living in that state of fright, flight, and scarcity.

So simply visualizing and feeling that wave of emotion that comes from being grateful for the visualization of something that hasn't happened yet come something true changes the chemical balance in your body.

When you are immersed in that feeling, and think of a couple of the things that you'd like to happen right now and how good it would feel if they were true, you'll release dopamine, the reward chemical. So that's very That has a really strong impact on your body. Then when you move it into, and now I'm giving gratitude for that, then you're also releasing oxytocin. So you've got this cocktail of really feel-good hormones.

What is one mistake that people make when they are making a vision board?

I have now learned to leave a lot of space on my board because I don't believe that my brain is capable of knowing how much I could manifest in this I love to leave a bit of room for magic. In the book where I do the chapter on actually how to make the board, I say, get the board, lay the images onto it, really ask yourself, do I want everything that's an image on there? If there's something that you thought you wanted, but it doesn't resonate, remove it. Have another flick through the magazines. If there's an image that isn't something that you thought you wanted, but it really speaks to you, try fitting that in. Leave it overnight, and I specifically said in a windproof, childproof, that proof place, and then come back the next day after having slept on it. And if you're sure that it's correct, then glue it into place. And then I start speaking to people who say to me, Yeah, I've done all that, but I just haven't glued it yet. And so I said, Oh, did you do it yesterday? No, months ago. And I just can't bring myself to glue it down.

I don't understand why. And I had, having been an experienced coach now for 15 years, I just had, and the answer to that just came into my mind through my gut. It was, You don't want to glue it down because you don't really believe that you deserve it. The tears just came, and it was the truth. So it was, These are the things that I want, but if I glue them down, I'm saying that I actually think I should get them. And deep down, I don't believe that, and that's why I haven't glued them down. So you might be listening now and think, Oh, yeah, I've done that, too, but I didn't really know why. So hopefully it will help.

What does the act of gluing signal to your brain in terms of what you want? And would you do that gratitude wash as you're doing it as a way to tap into magnetic energy? Because that's probably very thick old wiring. I actually said that to somebody recently where I was like, I don't even want to tell you that because I feel scared to say I want that thing. Yeah.

I feel like if you're gluing it down, you really mean it, right? And so if there's hesitation, that could be hard. I have never thought of this before, but your idea is brilliant. If you do it whilst giving gratitude, it'll probably make it feel much easier. It's a bit more like, I'll just be so grateful if this comes true, and I'm happy to partially put it out there and partially make the effort to do it. When I had my first one, when I was really broke, I was living in a studio apartment, and it was in the bathroom, which meant that anyone that came to my studio would see it. It had a specific It's a horrific amount of money on it, and it's very un-british to talk about money.

How much money was on it?

Thirty-five thousand pounds, so really not very much. I thought, Okay, this is a bit embarrassing. But then I thought, Well, anyone that I actually invite into my apartment who then uses my bathroom has got to be a close friend. So that just has to be okay. I got so much positive feedback from people saying, Oh, yeah, I looked at your vision board, and I can help you with that thing that I saw. And it was so sweet.

I can hear everybody now moving their vision boards from their bedside table to the bathroom. Okay, we're going to put this right in the bathroom. Through Manifesting, you're about to teach us how to rewire our brain and train it toward abundance.