How to Make Your Vision Board Work
By Jessica Wise
If you’re making a vision board every year and still feeling unaccomplished, stop reinventing the wheel (or the board in this case) and look in the mirror. I say this with love—it’s you, boo.
A vision board is not a magic wand that will make you a whole new person by tomorrow, the end of the quarter, or even the end of the year. It’s a tool you have to intentionally and consistently apply to your life until you reach your goals. It may seem like a daunting task, especially if your board is ambitious. But it’s not impossible at all. Here are five practical ways you can put your vision board to work and see tangible results:
1. Expose yourself to your vision board every day.
In order to achieve the goals on your vision board, you have to actually look at your vision board. Keep it somewhere you can easily see it every day. This will make your vision board a constant reminder of what you’re shooting for—a North Star for your year.
2. Identify concrete micro-steps to reach the goals on your board.
Your vision board might be your North Star, but the work you put it in is the path that guides your way. Break everything down into tangible and measurable micro-goals and micro-habits that lead to the end goals on your vision board. For example, if you have “visit Spain” on your board, determine what it takes to accomplish that. You need to get a passport, save up money for the trip (a real number, not an abstract one), and book your flight and lodging. Now you have a clear and concrete path to one of the goals on your board.
3. Consider making your board quarterly.
When you set a timeline too far away, it’s easy for things to get lost in the shuffle. Consider breaking your goals down into quarters instead of the whole year, updating your vision board every three months and pivoting if needed. This will help you better focus on a few goals at a time versus every single image on your board all at once.
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4. Anticipate your obstacles/distractions and how you’ll overcome them.
Having a plan is important, but expecting it to go over flawlessly is asking for disappointment. Sure, we’re millennials, but we’re not 18 anymore. We’ve been out in the world long enough to know something is going to go wrong. And that’s okay! If your goals were really that easy to achieve, they wouldn’t be on your vision board. Identify early on what may be standing between you and your goals, and prepare to fight for them. If you have “get a new job” on your vision board, but your resume is rusty, get a resume writer to help you. If you want to develop a morning routine, but get easily caught up with doom scrolling in bed, figure out how to break that habit so you get up and get moving. When you’re honest with yourself about where you may fall short, you can start finding solutions and stay on track.
5. Take five minutes every day to see yourself as the person you visualized.
Before every tour, Beyoncé says she has dreams about her show, and that’s how she puts them together. You can see your goals in the abstract stock images on your vision board, but you can’t always see yourself. Take five minutes to see yourself already living as the person you’ve built on your board. If you want to start a podcast, close your eyes in a quiet space and start visualizing yourself as a podcast host. Where are you recording it? What are you wearing? Who are you interviewing? What’s the name of the podcast? Get that specific. Trust me, manifestation is real.
Your vision board won’t work unless you do. When you start using it like a tool and not abstract art, you can go forth and conquer.
