Vision for 2016

  |   Patricia Tiernan

Seeing in a new year gives us a wonderful opportunity to reflect and identify fresh motivating goals for the year to come. Setting goals and working towards achieving them has been proven to make people feel happier. When we achieve a goal, be it big or small, we can get a rush of happiness, feelings of satisfaction, pride, pleasure etc.

For the last number of years, I have gotten great inspiration and enjoyment from creating a vision board of what I want the year ahead to look like. Creating a vision board is a fun way of reflecting on who you want to be and what you want to do with your life. My yearly vision generally includes work, personal development and personal life goals. I get great enjoyment from looking back on my vision boards and identifying what I have achieved and what may need further attention.

This year instead of making a somewhat depressing list of what you should give up, why not make an empowering vision board of the goals you would like to achieve and start making a plan of how you can achieve it.

 

Creating your Vision Board

  1. You need a large A4/A3 piece of paper or poster board. Old magazines with pictures, coloured pens, Pritt stick/glue and scissors.
  2. Find a quite place with lots of room.
  3. Pick your theme. For example  your vision of your life, your year ahead, your relationships, your new career etc. Ask yourself what it is you want? What would make you feel fulfilled? Go through your magazines and tear images from them that reflect what you want. No glueing yet! Just let yourself have lots of fun looking through magazines and pulling out pictures or words or headlines that resonate with you. Have fun with it. Make a big pile of images and phrases and words.
  4. Go through the images and begin to lay those that meet your needs most on the board. Eliminate any images that no longer feel right. This step is where your intuition comes in. As you lay the pictures on the board, you’ll get a sense how the board should be laid out. For instance, you might assign a theme to each corner of the board, career, self-development, health, relationships, for instance. Or it may just be that the board is an overall theme such as year ahead or a vision board that tells a story etc. The freedom is yours to create it in a way that feels right for you.
  5. Glue everything onto the board that means something to you. You can also write words with markers that reflect what you desire.
  6. Reflect on what you have created and what it is you desire. Add anything you feel is missing.
  7. Ask yourself what steps do I need to take to achieve this vision? What effect will achieving these goals have on you and the people around you? What are you willing to sacrifice to achieve these goals? What’s the first step? Who can support you to achieve your goals? When would you like to achieve your goals by?
  8. When finished, put your board somewhere you will see it regularly.
  9. Celebrate when you have achieved your goals!

Vision-Board