Losing Sight of Your Goals? We Have a Fun Solution For You

Usually the end of the year comes around, and we realize a bunch of the goals and resolutions we had started the year with haven’t been reached. This is us giving you a 3 month head start to get back on track, and hopefully the momentum will roll into the new year too. A season shift helps us reset and clarify, so let’s use it!

Here’s our solution: create a vision board. Does this sound a bit hokey to you? Perhaps a little new-agey? There’s been a lot of hype about vision boards in the last couple of years, but just give us some credit. We’re going to scale it back a bit and take some of the fluff out so the benefits of this practice can really sink in.

You’ve probably heard a saying similar to ‘energy flows where attention goes’. Absurdly straightforward right? You might be wondering how the vision board feeds into this.

Your Environment Shapes You

A vision board isn’t just a pretty picture you collage together to then somehow make your dreams magically manifest. Science has proven that your environment shapes you, especially the one that you are in contact with each and every day. The things around you either serve to inhibit or encourage particular habits. They enforce particular ways of seeing and being in the world. They direct your attention in specific ways.

On the most basic of levels: If your shelves are filled with junk food, you’re more likely to eat unhealthy snacks. If your exercise clothes, workout mat, and trainers are always ready and folded beside your bed, you’re more likely to put them on first thing and get moving. If your room is incredibly cluttered, you might feel more anxious and overwhelmed. And so on.

The Power of Visualization

Now the vision board comes in again. Simply put, it’s a visualization tool that helps you continuously, both consciously and unconsciously, engage with what you want in your present and future life. It is not a passive exercise. Once you’ve created it, it acts as a reminder in your environment. It’s also something you can use to reflect on for a few moments at the end of your day: What did I do in service of this vision today? What did I do to work against it?.

This helps keep you on track. Again, it’s not about this vision just drawing in from the universe that which you desire. It helps to motivate you into the process of creating it. It’s fun to make, it creates incentive, and it pulls you out of your daily grind of just getting the next thing in front of you done. It’s a mind exercise that brings about action. Visualization is something that great athletes and leaders have been using for decades. Now it’s time for you to give it a try.

What you’ll need

We’re going to keep it really simple for you, but the sky’s the limit so if you want to fancy it up and bring in paints or sparkles or treasured items or whatever else, then knock yourself out! What resonates and inspires each person is a really individual thing.

• A board of some kind: cork board, poster board, pin board etc.

• Scissors, tape, glue, pins (depending on type of board)

• A pile of varied magazines you don’t mind cutting up.

What you’ll do

Maybe you’re more inclined to use images that depict words, or maybe you find that distracting. Maybe you are drawn more towards images that depict a certain feeling like ‘being at ease’, or ‘happy’, or maybe you want representations of a place you want to be or things you want. Maybe you like the board to look minimalist and organized, or haphazard and completely filled. There is no wrong way to do it, and it can be a combination of everything.

• Put aside an hour or two. Create a space that feels comfortable and inspiring. Music or silence, nice smelling candles or snacks. Just do your thing.

• Spend about 15-20 min cutting or tearing the images from the magazines that most speak to you in a positive way. The important thing is that there is a feeling associated with each choice.

• Now spend a couple of minutes going through what you’ve torn out. Here is the time when you actually consider if they all have meaning for you. Discard the ones that don’t resonate as much as you thought.

• Create your board! No vision board looks the same. It is going to reflect YOU, and you are the one that is going to be looking at it every day. Check out the pictures above or some online examples if you really need a reference.

We just have one suggestion: Don’t over think it. Just follow your gut when you are picking things. Think of it as an intentional free-association process. Let your subconscious speak.

Enjoy!

References:

https://www.mindbodygreen.com/0-10921/want-to-achieve-your-goals-make-a-vision-board.html

http://www.huffingtonpost.com/elizabeth-rider/the-scientific-reason-why_b_6392274.html

https://www.rewireme.com/transformation-wellness/3-benefits-creating-vision-board/

https://www.positivechanges.com/blog/5-vision-board-benefits

http://www.saywowmedia.com/2016/02/13/vision-boards-mind-maps-subconscious-mind/