While a vision board might sound like an odd concept at first, there's a good chance that you've used a technique like this without even being aware of it. Have you ever cut out a recipe from a magazine, imagining yourself serving it at a dinner party?
What about taking a screenshot of an outfit you'd like to wear? Do you sometimes write a to-do list, forget all about it and then rediscover it to realize that you've done everything on the list? If any of these examples sound familiar, you've been doing something very similar to vision boarding.
However, there are ways to harness this sort of technique in even more powerful ways – and it's all more straightforward than you might think.
This article will walk you through everything you need to know about vision boards, from how they work to how you make them.
What Is A Vision Board?
In the simplest terms, a vision board (or dream board) is a collection of images that represent a goal. The aim of this tool is to focus your energy on a particular dream you have. As you find and display the images, you hone your sense of what you want to achieve, making your goals increasingly more concrete.
The Definition Of A Vision Board
The vision board is virtually limitless in its potential applications, there’s no one set way in which to present it.
Vision boards are unique to the person making them, you can use them to represent any dream in your life.
You’ll often see is a large corkboard with images pinned onto it. However, there are no rules, make it smaller (e.g. an A4 page) or larger (e.g. covering a wall).
Although there is much to recommend having a physical board, you can also choose to make it on your computer. You can print it out, or have it as your computer desktop.
The definition is loose enough to accomplish pretty much any collection of images that relate to a key goal.
How Does Vision Boarding Work?
Vision boarding is straightforward, and it works in large part by focusing your attention. For example, suppose you want to manifest love with a specific person.
In this case, your vision board might show fictional or famous couples you'd like to emulate, pictures of places you'd like to go, and quotes or poetry that exemplify your idea of true love.
Alternatively, imagine that your dream is to own a successful business. Your vision board might include images of other successful business owners who are role models to you, along with some motivational slogans. You can even include artwork or abstract representations of your goal.
Let’s look at the power of vision boards in a range of important areas linked to the Law of Attraction – manifestation, identifying wishes and desires, creative visualization and consistent visualization.
Then, we’ll move on to the practicalities – how to make a vision board actually works.
The Power Of Vision Boards For Manifesting
Now that you have a better sense of what a vision board looks like, how you make one and how it is used to facilitate particular life goals, let's take a closer look at how and why this technique is so powerful.
Firstly, remember that the Law of Attraction tells us to focus on abundance rather than lack.
In other words, it's only when we focus on positivity, on gratitude and on what we already have that we're able to attract more goodness into our lives.
Vision boarding can help with this a great deal.
Rather than getting caught up in thinking about how much you wish your life was different, you spend time and energy immersing yourself in your vision of what your life will become.
This helps you to vibrate on a higher frequency and keeps you feeling positive about what you're trying to manifest.
Secondly, vision boards can help you overcome limiting beliefs you have about yourself. Each time you choose an image that shows what you want to attract, you challenge that critical inner voice that says “I don't deserve that!” or “I could never have that.”
When you create a vision board, you commit to your limitless potential and nurture your sense of self-worth.
In addition, consider that having a vision board around helps to keep your mind constantly aware of accomplishing your life goals.
Even when you're not looking directly at your board, your subconscious mind will be tuned in to its presence.
And the more we concentrate on the things we want to attract, the more likely we are to manifest them at a faster rate.
Plus, your vision board can quickly shift your mood or mindset if you're starting to feel low, immediately giving you a vivid picture of the person you can become.
The Power Of Identifying Your Wishes & Desires
If you think back to when you were a kid, you probably remember having lots of wishes and desires.
When we're young, we're encouraged to have big dreams and to act out our imagined futures.
However, when we enter adulthood we start to get slightly different messages.
Some still encourage us to make wishes, but a nagging voice tells you to be “realistic” about what you dream.
But if you don't access your wishes and desires, you rob yourself of the chance to truly know yourself properly.
With vision boarding, you automatically tune into your fantasy of an ideal life.
The visual format can help you to drop your inhibitions, return you to the playful state of making collages.
As you do this, you may uncover new facts about your deepest values and what you want out of life. This, in turn, can ultimately help you to recalibrate your goals and plan for a happier, more ambitious future.
The Power Of Creative Visualization
If you're used other Law of Attraction techniques already, you are probably well acquainted with the tool of creative visualization.
This is an exercise where you close your eyes, enter a meditative state, and build up a detailed image of the life that you want to manifest.
Creative visualization helps you develop a clearer sense of what you desire.
It also encourages you to believe that this future can be yours.
Consequently, visualizing helps you to vibrate on a frequency of abundance rather than lack.
Focus your attention on who you are and what you can achieve, rather than on what you don't have.
Vision boarding can be seen as a kind of creative visualization as well.
Take your time building the image and frequently revisit it to focus on little details. In addition, you can use your vision board as a creative visualization tool.
Look at the collection of words and images before closing your eyes and building an image of your future.
The Power Of Consistent Visualization
The power of consistent visualization comes from particular positive habits being formed over time.
If you keep doing creative visualization exercises and keep building up your vision board, you train yourself to think about yourself (and the world) in a certain way.
In particular, you focus your mind on possibility, on optimism, and on your own value.
This, in turn, helps you not only to manifest the goal pictured on your vision board but also to manifest anything else that you want.
After all, the more you believe that you can do great things and deserve to do them, the more greatness you attract.
Consistent visualization is an especially potent item in your toolkit if you struggle with negative self-talk and have a loud inner critic.
In time, visualization exercises can transform the way you talk to yourself. Your vision board also gives you something concrete to turn to when you're feeling low, redirecting your attention from negativity to positivity.
In time, you will likely no longer need the vision board in this way, as your default view will be positive.
How To Make A Vision Board That Works
Now that you understand why vision boards are so powerful and effective, let's dig into the details of how you can best make your own board.
We'll walk you through the five major steps you need to take to make a board that supports your manifestation goals, whatever they are.
As we discuss these stages, we'll give you examples of vision boards that work, and help you circumvent some of the common problems or blocks you might encounter.
Stage 1: Define Your Goals
Before you start creating your vision board, it's vital that you get a clear sense of your wishes and desires so that you can formulate the right overall theme for the board.
Here are five of the most helpful questions to ask yourself when you're in the early planning stages.
These questions aren't only useful to those who have no idea how they'd like to use a vision board.
Even if you already think you have a pretty well-defined idea of what the vision board should focus on, asking yourself this list of questions can help to refine your dream and consider whether it's central to living your purpose.
1: Who do you want to be?
What kind of person do you want to be?
How do you want others to see you?
Which words do you want to be used to describe your future self?
Sometimes, making a list of your ideal traits is helpful.
Ask yourself: if you felt happy and whole, how would you be as a person?
How would you interact with others, what feelings would you most often feel, and what values would you live in accordance with?
2: Where do you want to be in life?
“Where” can encompass a wide range of important sub-questions.
There's the literal question of where in the world you want to live – in what town, in what country.
Then there's the question of the type of how you want to have – how you want it to look, whether it's in the city or the county, and who you share your space with.
Then there are more metaphorical questions about where you want to be.
What stage in your career do you want to reach? What is your dream workplace? How do you want to spend most of your free time?
3: What experiences do you want to have?
Next, consider the kinds of experiences that you want to have specifically related to your goal(s).
What do you imagine doing, and what will it feel like?
A short creative visualization exercise can be helpful here, where you close your eyes for 3-5 minutes and let your imagination show you the kinds of experiences that you want to have. Think about who you want to share these experiences with, as well.
If you're imagining a work scenario, who are your colleagues? And if your goals are about your personal life, what relationship experiences do you crave?
4: What vision board categories do you want to have?
You can have vision board categories on the one board, representing a range of goals.
These may be interrelated, or they may represent diverse parts of your life. Either way, try and narrow down the possible categories and pick the ones that are most vital to your happiness, well-being and personal development.
Remember, too, that you also have the option to create more than one vision board, so you needn't break one board up into categories if you'd prefer to keep each one thematically tight.
5: What kind of visual aids do you want to use?
Finally, give some preliminary thought to the kind of things you want to put on your vision board.
Are there particular images that already spring to mind? If so, what are the best sources for these images? And do you want to include objects? What about art?
We’ll delve into this in more depth in the next section.
Stage 2: Collect Pictures That Represent Your Goals
Now that you've dramatically narrowed the focus of your vision board and tuned into the kinds of feelings, experiences, and values that you want the board to represent, it's time to think more about what you'll actually display on it.
Firstly, note that you can use absolutely any material that draws you.
It can be paper, cardboard, material or solid objects like feathers, medals and so on.
Secondly, if you're just starting out then you'll find that magazines and online image searches can be great initial places from which to source appropriate images.
However, don't feel you need to restrict yourself to cut-out images and photographs. Feel free to draw, to paint, to use patterns to represent your goals, and so on.
Nothing is off-limits provided it connects you with your dream and keeps you in a positive mindset.
For many people, words also play a key role in making the vision board meaningful. These might be quotes, especially from your role models or from motivational speakers.
That said, you can also add single words that are key to your goal – words like “love”, “success” and “joy”.
If something makes you feel confident and excited about your life goal, put it on the vision board!
Stage 3: Connecting With Your True Self
To connect with your true self, you need to treat the act of making a vision board as a special kind of ritual.
One of the most important things you can do is find a quiet, safe space to do your work.
This technique is about tuning into your desires and values and shutting out all of the other influences.
Once you find a relaxing, calm place to create your vision board, make sure you have everything you need.
This might include your printed pictures, cut-outs from magazines, objects, glue, and so on.
Consider, also, if there's anything you can do to create a focused, soothing atmosphere.
Perhaps you want to turn on some motivational music or listen to meditative sounds from nature (e.g., waves or rainfall). Meanwhile, a scented candle can also help to set the mood. Use your favorite smells and ones that uplift you.
Read or listen to things that inspire you, looking at Law of attraction quotes or listening to a motivational speech will put you in the right state of mind.
Finally, many people find it helpful to take time to meditate before creating a vision board. Sit for a few minutes, breathing slowly and deeply, and focus on the present moment. Let distractions float away, think about the dream your vision board is supposed to represent, and then open your eyes.
You're now ready to start making your vision board.
Stage 4: Creating Your Vision Board
The above guidance tells you much of what you need to know about the literal act of creating your vision board.
At this stage, you'll have chosen a range of images and words that best represent your hopes and dreams.
However, a vision boarding works best if you can truly concentrate on what you're doing.
If you start feeling like now might not be the right time, take a break and do it later.
It's better to be in the right frame of mind than forcing yourself to complete it in one go.
Find the right balance between being careful about the placement of your images and being so worried about their location that you inhibit your own creativity.
Although it's helpful for your board to convey a narrative (i.e., for the order of images to make sense to you), there are no hard and fast rules about exactly where and how the images and words need to be placed.
Trust your intuition, even if you're not sure why it's guiding you to put an image in a particular place.
Stage 5: Consistent Visualization
Finally, remember that the power of vision boarding goes far beyond the moment when you create the board.
Indeed, It's vital for you to regularly look at your vision board to get the most out of it.
Law of Attraction authors and experts recommend a process they call consistent visualization.
This means you should take a few moments to contemplate your board every day.
Experiment with doing this at different times of the day. For example, some people prefer to look at their board first thing in the morning to set up the day.
Others like to look at it as to wipe their mental slate clean before they fall asleep.
Part of consistent visualization also involves finding ways to regularly update your board. For example, you might add a new word every day – one that represents how you want to feel.
One day, it might be “healthy”, for example. Another day, you might choose “powerful” or “strong.”
This keeps your vision board focused on feelings and personal development, rather than specific material gain.
Remember, too, that you can add images later as well if they strike you as particularly relevant to your goal.
You can think of your vision board as a constantly evolving image of your desires, rather than a static image of one day's interpretation of those desires.
Need More Vision Board Ideas Or Help?
As well as adding to your vision board over time, be aware that you can expand it in significant ways or even update it as your wishes and desires change.
We don't always want the same things as time passes, and it's entirely healthy for you to adjust your vision board to reflect your personal evolution. In some cases, you may even prefer to make an entirely new board.
Never feel beholden to something that feels like it no longer represents you. The vision board works for you, not the other way around.
Finally, if you want to find more specific step by step instructions that help you get the most out of your vision board, get our free Law of Attraction Tool Kit. It also includes inspiring affirmations that can support the manifestation goals on your vision board. It's powerful, clear, and easy to use.
The post Vision Board – A Powerful Tool To Manifest Your Dream Life appeared first on The Law Of Attraction.
* This article was originally published here
