"Make sure you visualize what you really want, not what someone else wants for you"
About this Quote
The specificity of "really want" does a lot of labor. It implies a split between surface wants (the ones that earn approval) and deeper wants (the ones that might cost you status). Gillies isn't just promoting positive thinking; he's challenging the social economy around aspiration. Parents, partners, bosses, even the broader culture all offer pre-made scripts: stable career, respectable milestones, palatable dreams. Visualizing "what someone else wants for you" is the mental version of living in borrowed clothes - it fits well enough to get you through public life, while slowly erasing your silhouette.
Contextually, Gillies comes out of the late-20th-century motivation and visualization boom, an era that promised inner control in a world of corporate hierarchies and mass media persuasion. That backdrop makes the quote less airy and more defensive. It's about reclaiming authorship. If your goals are partly hallucinated by someone else's approval meter, then even success can feel like a misdiagnosis: impressive results, wrong patient.
Quote Details
| Topic | Goal Setting |
|---|---|
| Source | Help us find the source |
| Cite |
Citation Formats
APA Style (7th ed.)
Gillies, Jerry. (2026, January 16). Make sure you visualize what you really want, not what someone else wants for you. FixQuotes. https://fixquotes.com/quotes/make-sure-you-visualize-what-you-really-want-not-119513/
Chicago Style
Gillies, Jerry. "Make sure you visualize what you really want, not what someone else wants for you." FixQuotes. January 16, 2026. https://fixquotes.com/quotes/make-sure-you-visualize-what-you-really-want-not-119513/.
MLA Style (9th ed.)
"Make sure you visualize what you really want, not what someone else wants for you." FixQuotes, 16 Jan. 2026, https://fixquotes.com/quotes/make-sure-you-visualize-what-you-really-want-not-119513/. Accessed 11 Feb. 2026.










