As we welcome a new calendar year we often find ourselves planning, reflecting, and goal setting for the year ahead. Yearly goals can include a wide range of aspirations including more travel, professional growth, becoming more physically fit, or starting a spiritual journey. No matter the goal, a great way to help keep you accountable is to create a vision board. You are 42 percent more likely to achieve your goals if you write them down. Getting your goals down on paper not only forces you to get clear on what, exactly, it is that you want to accomplish, but doing so plays a part in motivating you to complete the tasks necessary for your success.
A vision board is a visual representation of your goals. Typically seen in a poster board formats, vision boards include a visual display of inspiring images and text that relate to your goal(s) and vision(s) for the year ahead. Creating a vision board is a wonderful first step to showing up as the best version of yourself in 2021. Here are our tips to create your new year vision board:
Step 1: Ask yourself some guiding questions
Before you start cutting magazines to create your vision board, begin by reflecting on what it is you really want by asking yourself a few simple questions. These questions may be specific to you & your dream life, but some general ones to guide you are:
– What do I value?
– What needs would I like met?
– What do I want out of life?
– How do I want to feel?
We suggest taking some time to gain clarity, then grabbing a journal to answer these questions.
Bonus Option: Create a tag line or affirmation to represent your vision board.
Step 2: Organize your needs & wants
Review your answers to the questions answered in step 1, and categorize each into groups. Some areas that may come out naturally include: health & wellness, travel, relationships, financial, and/or personal growth. An easy way to do this is to underline each with a different color marker or pen to represent the various categories.
Step 3: Write down your goals
We are taking it back to school with this one, focusing on SMART goals. We will use our categorized needs & wants from the first two steps to become even more clear on exactly what we would like to see come to fruition.
As a reminder, SMART goals are:
Specific
Measurable
Achievable
Realistic
Time Bound
This is not to say you shouldn’t dream big, more importantly this will give you guidance to feel like even your biggest dreams are attainable.
Step 4: Decide on your medium
In this age, you may consider using an app to create a digital vision board. This allows for easy editing as well as less paper waste.
However, you need a break from being on a screen all day, or a reason to use up old magazines, the traditional route may be more suited for you. Physically making a vision board to become crystal clear on your goals is a perfect activity to enjoy alone, or with other members of your household.
Both mediums have their benefits, so you really cannot go wrong here. Take a look at the resources below to help make your decision.
Digital vision board resources:
– Vision Board: a free app that allows you to create, edit, update, and track your goals from your phone. You can upload your own images, set specific dates for your goals, and create multiple boards at once.
– Canva: a free app that allows you to create a wide range of digital designs. This works both on your desktop, or as an app on your phone so you have some flexibility. This is a much more abstract tool with a ton of creative freedom.
– Pinterest: this may be a helpful tool for both planning or executing your vision board. Use it as an image search engine, means for inspiration, or as a way to gather and organize the imagery you will use elsewhere.
Physical vision board resources:
– Old magazines, photos, books, or items that you don’t mind cutting up.
– Glue, scissors, and/or tape will likely be needed to execute.
– Paint, glitter, or other mediums you would like to include that provide positivity or inspiration.
– A piece of cardboard or card stock may be useful to create your vision board on so it holds it shape once you begin adding items.
Whichever you choose, let this process reflect you as an individual and the life you want to live. If you desire more simplicity, but you’d like to make a physical vision board, create something that reflects exactly that.
Bonus Option: Create a vision journal to answer your questions, create your vision board, and reflect daily, even if you are on the go.
Step 5: Dedicate a time & space to get creative
Now that we have gotten crystal clear on all that we desire, the goals we will meet to achieve our dream life, and what mediums we will use, it’s finally time to begin! We suggest setting aside specific time to focus on bringing your vision to life to minimize distractions and maximize focus. You’ll want to collect all your supplies and ensure you have plenty of room to feel comfortable and work as needed.
We also recommend adding some inspiring music, aromatherapy, and/or stretching before hand to reset your space and mindset. Making a vision board to become crystal clear on your goals, dreams, and desires only works if you are present in the process.
Once you get started, let yourself flow, and have fun with it!
Step 6: Display it in a visual place
Whether you created a digital or physical vision board, it is important to place it somewhere visual when it is completed. Even if you created a digital version, consider investing a few dollars to have it printed so you can hang it in your home or office.
Bonus Option: Take a photo, or save your digital version, to use as the background of your laptop and/or phone.
Step 7: Visit your vision board daily
Each day, take a few moments to look at your vision board. This may be beneficial in morning or the evening, depending on your lifestyle. When you are not distracted, carefully examine every aspect and imagine how it could exist in your life. Consider how each item makes you feel. If you are a spiritual person, consider praying or saying a daily affirmation as you visit your vision board.
If you’d like, consider adding a note, or gold star, to each item as they come to fruition in your life.
Additionally, we recommend revisiting your SMART goals regularly and ask yourself how you can work towards each. It is important you do the work in your daily life, in addition to visualizing what you want and need.
Bonus Option: Recreate or add to your vision board at different stages of your life. It could even be fun to make one with your soon-to-be-spouse to vision a marriage you both desire.
Regardless of the time of year, your age, or life status, there is always room for growth. By creating a vision board using the steps above, you will gain clarity to your deepest desires, outline goals to achieve them, and continually inspire yourself to strive for a life you deserve.
