By Brenda W Hargroves
I’m all for vision boards! My latest one prominently hangs on a wall in my office.
A vision board is an excellent way to remove all the clutter (politics, the state of the economy, the #&#% pandemic) and concentrate on your personal goals and affirmations.
My Handling Your Business Facebook group co-administrator and I held a BYOB Virtual Vision Board Party last week. It was so much fun, we just might make it an annual event!
During the event, I talked about the daunting temptation to make New Year’s resolutions which, by the way, I prefer to think of as goals. You know – what are your goals for the coming year? Do you want to find a new job or start a small business? Do you want to save money for a house? Do you want to write the next best-selling novel? Do you want to exercise more and lose five pounds? OK, ten pounds. We’ll stop there. But you get the point. The list goes on and on…
Narrow your search. Do a deep dive into your imagination. Dream big. What do you envision? Set goals and make a list. Then decide what you want most by looking at the positive and negative ‘what ifs’. What’s the worst that could happen? Could you possibly accomplish another goal on your list as a result of that choice? After you complete this exercise, you can then prioritize and pick the one or more goals that most satisfy your vision. You might have to do a couple of rounds of elimination, but eventually you’ll get there.
Another useful tactic is to consider a resolution you made last year. Did you achieve the desired results? If you did, congratulations. If not, is achieving that result still important to you? If so, then remember, nothing is written in stone. Think about how you can tweak the resolution to make it more reachable, not easy, but reachable. Then go for it again!
So, resolutions—done.
Think about revelations. In addition to resolutions, I suggested the party participants consider revelations. What did you learn this past year? Did you benefit from the lesson? What happens now because of that revelation? Here’s an example of what I’m talking about.
I learned a concept at the end of last year that made a powerful impression on me. A newsletter I read featured an interview with James Clear, who wrote a book called Atomic Habits. In it, he talks about something he calls “identity-based habits.” This term suggests not worrying about the results you want and instead, focus on becoming the person who can successfully achieve the desired result or goal. And, he gave examples. One of them relates to the weight goal I mentioned above. He said, “Instead of worrying about losing 40 pounds, focus on being the kind of person who doesn’t miss workouts.”
Another example he cited resonated with me because I’m an author. He said, “Rather than worrying about finishing a novel, focus on being the kind of person who writes every day.” This concept is my revelation. In order to progress as an accomplished author, I have to write every day.
I also assessed a few images on the last vision board I created to see how they progressed.
My Hair, My Way – Getting more gray by the minute; hope it shows increased wisdom.
Yes, I Did! – Successfully reached several of my writing goals. Alas, many more to go before I achieve best-selling author status.
Making An Impact – I believe I’ve done so and hope to continue.
Take Care of Yourself – I’m in good health and so far (fingers-crossed) have avoided Covid.
So how about it? I challenge you to create a vision board. It can be general in nature or concentrated on specific goals, such as entrepreneurship, finance management, or wellness.
Let me know how it turns out in the comment section.
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