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365 Ways to Get Results: Day #49: Create Your Vision Board – Watch it Happen
A Vision Board reflects vivid imagery to remind you every day of where you are going. Not sure where that is? Read along.
You can’t get to a destination if you don’t know where that is. You create your Vision Board to reflect where you see yourself or your business when you’ve reached your ultimate goal. This will add clarity to your calling and allow you to visit a crisp image of where you are headed every day – even if right now that image looks more like an out of focus blur.
Supplies You Will Need to Create Your Vision Board
1. Poster or foam board.
2. Markers
3. Yes! Glue or Rubber Cement. Not Elmer’s glue as it will ripple your images.
4. A stack of magazines of varying types. Collect them from friends or doctor’s offices. Make sure they are different or you will be limited. Use magazines on business, fashion, women’s issues, sports, nature, cooking, fitness, travel, etc. You may choose to use photographs or other art textures.
How to Create Your Vision Board
1. Prepare yourself to be open. Sit quietly in a warm and comfortable place that inspires you before beginning to create your Vision Board. Put on inspirational or calming music. Light a candle or open a window for the fresh sounds and smells of nature. Allow your stressors, your worries, your outside influences and your ego to take a back seat for a little while. Relax completely and let your mind go blank. Don’t concentrate on the end results. Concentrate on nothing – just being.
2. Have tools of inspiration in front of you. These include but are not limited to a desk accessory that inspires you, a photograph, your journal or the results of exercises you may have done on my Web site that have helped you define your VALUES, your STRENGTHS, your SUCCESS SKETCH, your PURPOSE.
3. Spread out magazines of all types. Go through them collecting images and words that evoke wonder and joy as well as those that reflect the state of fulfillment you want to achieve. You may not entirely know what your “Vision” is. That is ok. Your Board may be an “Open and Accepting” Vision Board. It is important to gather images that evoke a positive emotion – even if the image is not reflective of anything in particular. What takes your breath away? What makes you smile? What makes you feel love? Make a big pile. Have a lot of fun!
4. Begin to select the images and words that truly speak to where you want to be and place them on the blank board. Eliminate images that are not quite right. You will get a sense of how you want to design your board when you begin to create. You may make concentric rings – each one reflecting a certain part of your vision. Or you may have corners dedicated to certain themes. Be free!
5. Permanently affix images and words to the board. Glue down the images. Write powerful words on the board that describe your vision: “Sales Genius,” “Social Media Maven,” “Six Digit Business.” You may want to put a photograph of yourself on the board.
6. Place your vision board where you will see it every day – and often times each day. Celebrate its message.
A Vision Journal
You may find that you will go through many transitions in your life. Some of my clients keep their vision images in a journal so that the vision ebbs and flows with their changing situation. For this all you will need is a hard bound journal to replace the foam board above. Create!
This is a great activity to do with some friends on a cold winter afternoon or evening. See yourself where you want to be – not the impediments that are before you today. Reflect on that image every day. Start now and watch what happens!
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Mary Lee Gannon is the president of StartingOverNow.com – Leading Productivity Solutions for People and Organizations. Mary Lee is a graduate of The Duquesne University Professional Coaching Program and an alumnus of the 2010 Harvard Medical School and McLean Hospital Coaching in Medicine & Leadership Conference. Her personal turnaround came as a stay-at-home mother, with four children under seven-years-old, who endured a divorce that took she and the children from the country club life to public assistance from where within a short time she worked to the level of CEO. Services include: Workshops, Meeting Facilitation, Coaching, Webinars, Speaking and Management Consulting. Areas of Specialty: Strategic Planning / Board Development / Healthcare / Public Relations / Goal Setting / Meeting Facilitation / Acountability / Leadership / Time Management / Life/Career Transition. Her book “Starting Over – 25 Rules for When You’ve Bottomed Out” is available in bookstores or at Amazon. Get her FREE ebook – “Grow Productivity – A Leader’s Toolbox” on her web site at www.StartingOverNow.com.
