THE EFFECTIVENESS OF A VISION BOARD

Vision Board : a term we hear often these days, it’s been around for quite some time but seems to be becoming more and more popular, and righly so in my opinion.

Coming from a design background someone like me wouldn’t have any problem making my own personal vision board, yet, I kept on putting it off, waiting for a friend to do it with me, waiting for the right pictures, the right moment, season, mood…waiting while time went by, rather flew by...and I was always without my much desired Vision Board.

One fine day, I was quite desperate for things to change, could wait no more and decided to have a go at it, no matter what and strangely enough, within two days my friend also joined me. It took us all of two hours to pull out the pictures from the magazines we had been setting aside for over 24 months, sift through them, cut, arrange and paste them onto the chart. Two extremely satisfying and joyful hours as we let our fancy free, our dreams  resurface, our desires take flight. It took another half an hour to totally clean up the mess and put up the Vision Board in a prominent place where we would be seeing it daily, before going to bed and upon waking up. 

Work Done = Satisfaction and Pleasure

Roughly 12 months down the lane I must say that it has worked like a charm…not only does it give me immense pleasure to actually see what bring me joy and what I would like manifested in my life, it does seem to be helping in pushing me along to achieve it, to get further clarity in my aims and goals and thoughts.

I feel that it works even when I am not actively and intentionally looking at it.

The images remind me of what I love – beauty, harmony, quality, spirituality, relaxation, productive satisfying work, a holiday by the seaside, teaching, nature…. I am sure that having it around in plain sight, subconsciously, I am being drawn closer and closer to my goals. I am also becoming aware of what is missing in my Vision Board that I want, and I will be adding that, soon, very soon!

So, my personal recommendation to all of you who have not yet put your desires into words and pictures, please do it. Within the week. You will be very pleasantly surprised at the results! Things may even materialise beyond your original desires.

A few tips from my experience...

 

How to make a Vision Board:

Think carefully of what makes you happy, what you like, what you love doing, what you would like to do and have in life. Take your time over this, jot it down. Don’t worry if it’s still vague and hazy, just keep jotting down what makes you happy/ what you think will add to your happiness.

Gather some magazines/pictures related to your interests/wants/objects of desire. Choose the ones you like most, those you respond to on an emotional level, pull out and cut. Put together pictures of a similar kind, those for example that represent travel or family or home. You may have too many or too few of a kind but don’t worry, the process will help you clarify your ideas.

Grab some scissors, glue and board paper (A 4 size is too small, my suggestion is to go as big as you can handle). 

Start placing the cut pictures onto the paper, play with the placements and the free spaces. Have FUN!

This is the part where we have a lot of fun, it also helps us cristallize our ideas…we realise that we need more pictures of a kind or there is something we haven’t yet got. You could use artist’s tape to try placing the pictures and holding them in place until you feel sure, then glue them, add words if you wish, design around spaces if you feel like it.

Hold it away from you and bask in the satisfaction of having made your first Vision Board. This is a start, as time goes by, you may realise that you need to refine your vision, your goals. No sweat. Make a new one, more aligned with the new, clearer you! 

If anyone in the family does not understand it, bless them with love and understanding, that they too may realize how powerful it can be in helping them live their best.

Let the magic unfold. God Bless!

THE POWER OF WRITING THINGS DOWN

Has anyone noticed that when you put pen to paper, more things happen than when you simply keep them in mind? 

Be it To Do lists, Shopping Lists, Checklists of things you need to tell you car mechanic or your doctor, routines you need to establish, things you would like to do, goals you’d like to accomplish, whatever it is, having it down on paper seems to unleash miraculous forces that come together to make things happen.

Putting things on paper also frees your mind from having to remember. You can utilise precious energies and valuable memory space for things that are really useful and important to improving your life. It is true that mind-games like trying to remember numbers and names and lists may help to keep your memory sharp but there are more fun and rewarding ways to do it as well, ways that help you further your goals in life.

When you pen down lists, ideas and goals, you don’t forget something important. This saves a lot of time, energy and undue stress. Many times have I returned home from a shopping trip with everything in my bag except for what I set out to get, simply because I did not pen down a list or if I did take the trouble to do it, I forgot to check it at the store. This had me rushing back to the store, trying to look cool, calm and collected in front of the cash clerks or I would go to a different store, farther away or simply do without (not a nice feeling!). Quite hilarious now, in hindsight, but not at the moment when I needed the stuff and was pressed for time.

Our mind processes tens of thousands of thoughts daily, if we were to manage the quality and direction of these thoughts in a more conscious and intentional way, we can move faster towards the life we dream of. Rich, abundant, Joyous, Vibrant, Stress free…..

Despite having jotted down the things I would like to do and my goals in life at various points I did not always follow the plan or keep myself steadily on course. ‘Life Happens’ was my excuse and time and again I would find myself having to start the goal setting process all over again. 

All because I would allow myself to get distracted by the course of events in my life. Believe me getting distracted easily is not fun, even if it seems like fun at that particula moment and can you get to pay a very heavy price further down the line. Time moves on and suddenly we wake up to the fact that we have accomplished a bit less than we had dreamed of.

I would chance upon old notebooks with my goals jotted down neatly and I realised that I had somehow managed to achieve most of them, perhaps not in the time frame planned or not exactly in the way imagined, but still, most of them had turned into reality despite the distractions. The one regret I do have is not having put ‘Become Rich’ ever on my Goals List. I am correcting that. 

Another recent instance showed me the power of penning things down. A few months ago in a bout of inspiration I had jotted down a list of Fun tasks I would like to do. I taped it to a wall where I promptly forgot to look at it (working on eradicating this habit) and saw it again as I was looking for wall space to tape my new Babysteps to Wellness checklist. ‘I need to get down to doing these’, I was telling myself when I realised that I had already accomplished five upon the eleven listed! Not bad for a gal who in the meantime, has been travelling quite a bit, had her home burgled and struggled with a few personal issues.

It hit me again with force that when I jot things down, things start to “happen”. This seems to work best when you write things down onto paper, somehow different from typing them into an electronic device. There is something about the forming of letters by hand that seems to burn them into our brain.

This also brings me to the reflection that if I were to really concentrate my energies in keeping my goals in sight, planning them with a realistic timeline and keeping distractions under control, it won’t be long before I see miracles, more miracles, bigger, grander, more awe-inspiring miracles in my life. 

I am working on a lot of fronts in my life and at times I get very distracted still from my chosen path but I believe that I will get there. We all will. Thank you all for being part of my Journey and God Bless!

PS: ‘BE IMMENSELY RICH’ is on my list. The more you have, the more you have to give!

ON DETACHMENT – FROM POSSESSIONS TO PEOPLE OR VV

I LOVE, ADORE, ENJOY, NEED, WANT TO KEEP FOREVER  the things I own and the people who are dear to me.

Does this describe you? Be honest, give it some thought.

It used to describe me, still does at times. Letting go is tough.

Some of us are deeply attached to things, some to people, often some to both things and people. When we lose someone we love our world comes crashing down, we fall to pieces. If we lose a favourite possession, it can cast a shadow on our life and affect our mood for days. Life means Loss as well as Love – even the Loss of Love, the breaking-up of a friendship, the break-in of a house, the loss of health and vitality, the loss of youth and innocence; life as we experience it, is in constant mutation. Everything is in a state of flux.

“Change is the only constant in this world.” The Bhagwad Gita

The more we fight change, the more we resist, the more we suffer….and boy, have we suffered?

I thought I was pretty well adjusted having grown up in different cities, different schools, moving every few months, having to settle and make new friends, at times even losing treasured possessions during the moves etc. and yet, I yearned for roots and was deeply attached to a few people and a few things.

Things break or get lost, people move on, people betray your trust, your friendship, some leave the world, some decide to leave. Where does this leave you?

Pretty much down in the dumps. Your world is shattered, life seems to hold no meaning.

Why did this have to happen, of all people, to me? What have I done to deserve this? I am such a “good” person!

Why? Why? Why? I cannot remember the innumerable times this tape has played on in my pretty little head, when I lost a loved one, when I lost my precious stuff, when my home was burgled or my brand new car stolen, the loss of friends I treasured, people who simply left for one reason or another, an illness, an accident…countless occasions of painfully experiencing loss. 

There is no simple direct answer to why? or why me?

Let’s try WHY NOT? WHY NOT ME?

I’m as good and as bad as the next person, unique but subject to the same fortunes and misfortunes unless I learn how to deal with my disasters and count my blessings and channel my energies into my own Personal Quest.

“ Often, it is pain and suffering that causes us to grow the most”.

 

As the years pass, I learn to live with loss, to accept the passing of things and people and events. I learn to accept life and face whatever it brings with Joy and Serenity. I learn to meditate constantly, to channel my energies into intentionally seeking more Joy, into further growth. I learn to be grateful for whatever comes. Here, the miracles start unfolding, situations may seem the same from an objective point of view, at times even worse, but my world is no longer the same.

A case in point – my home was broken into a few years ago and the robbers took away most of my jewellery, part of my family heritage. It took me months to get over the disgust at the invasion of privacy, to accept the loss, to recover from the feeling of vulnerability and fear, to sleep without waking at the slightest noise. For weeks I had a sick feeling in the pit of my stomach and felt very unsafe in my own home.

I shifted away all my remaining precious stuff away from home and as the years went by I realised that I wasn’t enjoying what I had. As I regained my normal optimisim and faith in life, I started bringing things back into the house and began to use and enjoy what I owned. In the ups and downs of life my Quest continued and I grew as a person besides growing older and definitely wiser, I like to say.

A few months ago my home was broken into again and I suffered the loss of valuables and family heirlooms again. The buggers even took away some of my clothes! Again that feeling of helplessness and wrenching in the pit of my stomach, nausea, fear, vulnerability. It lasted all of two days, with a few more days to completely absorb the shock. I realised that I was not using what had been stolen, valuable though it was. Strangely enough, the jewellery I loved and used almost on a daily basis was left behind though it had been in full sight of anyone searching the house. 

This is when it hit me: ‘Use it or lose it.’

Things, skills, capabilities, memory, our brain, and even people….nurture lovingly what is in your life or it will leave, languish in disuse or die of a broken heart. I even blessed the items extracted from my possession hoping they were of use to someone. Now that, in my book, is definite progress.

Within a few months of the second robbery, the house was broken into again during my absence. What was taken this time round? Nothing that I can put a hand on so far, nothing I am missing. Was I sick? No. Irritated? Yes, quite a bit about the mess they left and enough to put prominent signs over all entry points requesting them to leave us in peace seeing they have already stolen the valuables and I have no wish to clean up again after them, with thanks for their consideration, with love and blessings!

Why is this? Does my home no longer contain items that I treasure or love or items that would still fetch a “price” on the market? It is still a home, it contains my possessions even though the “pricey” ones are gone. I still treasure some of what remains. It is just that I have detached to a great degree. I have accepted the fact that my home may be targeted again in today’s worsening crime situation. I cannot afford to live with fear as a constant companion, with worrying about when and if someone may break in again. This is a conscious Decision reached after a long-long process. 

As a human, these emotions remain and resurface every now and then but my Journey is teaching me to detach more, to face my fears and worries and say: “So what? I have lived through so much, I can handle it.”

"How many things have I outgrown, lost, been robbed of, had destroyed; ideas, people, things, moments… Look at me. I have survived. Here I am, not only ready for more of life but happy to share the lesson and the wisdom.”

"This too shall pass."

 

Try affirming this aloud…I know that all of you have been through really rough situations.

This kind of detachment brings Freedom, Serenity and a deep-rooted sense of self-confidence. 

God made us capable, He has gifted and blessed us to get through it all. He stands by us. All we need to do is have faith and seek our path.

May God Bless us All!