Remember your New Year’s resolutions? If you’re like us, you probably started off strong in 2017, but have lost some of that all-too-crucial steam. Enter the vision board: a tool used to help clarify, concentrate and maintain focus.
Sure, visualisation or manifestation isn’t necessarily a new concept (you may remember the hype surrounding the best-selling 2006 self-help book, The Secret), but there’s no better time than the beginning of the year for planting seeds that you’d like to manifest over the coming year. Whether you’re looking to buy your first home or change careers, a vision board could be the secret to your success. And if Oprah Winfrey and Will Smith swear by them, I guess we can get on board too.
To give us the inside scoop on the reason vision boards work and how to make your own, we turned to author and business and personal coach, Jennifer Lander.
What’s the purpose of a vision board?
“The purpose of a vision/mood board is to clarify the way you want your life to look and feel. We often spend more time planning a holiday than we do planning the type of life we want to live. A vision board helps you to reflect and focus your attention on what you want your life to be like.
The reason a vision board works is that our mind is only 10% conscious thoughts (the mental chatter that you are consciously aware of) and 90% unconscious. Our unconscious mind can’t tell the difference between real and imaginary. In the same way athletes use visualisation to enhance their performance, for example, imaging shooting the goal before taking it, a vision board turns ours minds attention to creating these things in our lives. A vision board focuses our unconscious minds attention to attracting the images, phrases and feelings you want in your life.
If you are a visual or creative person or someone who likes to ‘use their hands’ vision boards can be particularly effective for you.”
How do you create a vision board?
1. Collect old magazines or gather images from the internet.
2. Cut out pictures or phrases which reflect how you want your life to look and feel. Don’t over think it too much (e.g. “I could never live there or do that), go with your first gut instinct. Remember when creating your vision board that psychology research has shown that experiences (e.g. travel, hobbies) and connection with other people make us happier than materialistic things.
4. Once you’ve collected the pictures that best reflect how you want your life be, arrange them on a piece of cardboard or pinboard and then fasten them using glue, pins or sticky tape
5. You can either display the vision board in a place you look at regularly (e.g. above your desk, back of the door) or once you have created and looked at it, you can put it in a draw. I have done the latter and 12 months later when moving house I found the vision board and was amazed at how many of the images had come true in my life.
6. Once you’ve created your vision board you may also like to write down your goals for the next 12 months, including sub-goals for each 90 day period as it seems more achievable when you break down your goals into sub-goals.
How often should you update or re-do your board?
“I’d suggest updating or re-doing your vision board approximately every 12 months or when you have a big life change (e.g. moving locations, career or significant relationship change).”
