Once upon a time, I would roll my eyes when I heard people talking about creating a Vision Board in order to manifest what they wanted. Ok. Sure.
I looked at Vision Boards as merely a fun activity to make a pretty collage // art piece that represented things you wanted and that's it.
Then the entire idea, concept and any conversation of Vision Boards completely left my experience for years and I never gave them a second thought. [Because I dismissed them - they had to leave.]
Years later, I started taking on Branding clients and creating 'Mood' Boards as visual direction and inspiration for their ultimate design. [I didn't see the connection between Mood Boards and Vision Boards until much later on.]
Then I started playing with Abundance about a year ago and started learning about how our thoughts control our emotions and create our reality. [The Law of Attraction.]
Then I 'stumbled' upon a video of a woman talking about how she makes at least $1k / day and that caught my attention - I mean - I'm for it! Yes please - thank you!
She talked about the Law of Attraction and getting clear on her WHY and setting intentions and visualizing the life that she wants and clearing out old, limiting beliefs around money AND creating a Vision Board.
I was totally on board [no-pun intended, who am I kidding? Pun, totally intended] with the rest of it, having done a majority of that work already and decided to give making a Vision Board a go, since I'd never done it before -- other than creating Mood Boards -- and this is what I created.
My Vision Board in all her glory. I look at this image and I see the life I want to create and it makes me happy and excited and expectant for what's to come.
I'm going to break down my board below - image by image - and tell you how it started to work within just a couple of hours after I made it and WHY. Buckle up, this is gonna be a wild ride.
Let's start in the center and work our way out from there...
As you can see, that's me in the center. I put myself in the center, not because I think I'm the center of the Universe, but because this is a vision for MY life and I wanted to get used to seeing myself with these kinds of things that I want.
I wanted to create a pattern in my brain that associates ME with the things I want in my life - not just because I want them - but because they are a match for who I am.
NOTE: I've not seen this as a step in other Vision Board posts or talks before, but if you're going to make one - and I encourage you to do so - put yourself in the center of it so you can start to create those associations for yourself.
Next, and here's where it immediately started to get uncomfortable for me, I put images of Money, Books, the NY Times, TED, a woman speaking in front of a large crowd and a quote on how I can change the world.
Being a Writer & Author
I've wanted to write books for years now and becoming a NY Times Best-Selling Author is one of my dreams. I'm actually participating in a Mastermind Group, starting in two weeks, led by a NY Times Best-Selling Author, so I'm already starting the process of surrounding myself with people who have gone before me.
NOTE: It may be nerve-wracking at first to put it 'out there' that you want to be a New York Times Best-Selling author or speak at TED [spoiler] - especially when you're currently so far away from those BIG goals - but it's ok. Get comfortable being uncomfortable with that idea so that you can start to shift into an energetic match for those goals.
Being a Teacher & Speaker
I also REALLY enjoy public speaking - I know, who says that? I was on the Speech Team in HS, placed every single time I performed ANYTHING, even when I was given the script the night before the tournament and have two personal State Championship Titles. I say this, not to brag or declare that I'm the best or to even relive old glory days. I say this to remind myself that I'm capable and that I'm a good communicator. I speak every chance I get and am open to receiving more opportunities around speaking and teaching. Speaking on the TED stage is an honor I want to attain.
Being Wildly Wealthy & Generous
And then there's the money. I want to be outrageously wealthy. I want to be a reverse tither. I want to be SO wealthy that I can travel the world, support myself and my family and all of our dreams on only 10% of my income, while giving 90% of it away to people and charities. I want to be SUCH a force for good in this world, which ties into the quote image that I included from Darling that reads...
“Darling, you — are a catalyst for change, really good change — in your own life & in the lives of those you care about. ”
Moving down from the center of my Vision Board, we work our way into quite possibly the largest dream and goal I have for my life // career and that is to create The Podge Co.
The Podge Co.
I dream of creating a school // commune for people to come and live together, grow together, learn together, explore together, do good together, etc. I see the lodging as a bunch of tiny homes together centered around the communal spaces. I see everyone working together to make life there sustainable and spending each night at an endlessly long farm table sharing the food we've grown and having deep and meaningful conversations around the things we're learning about ourselves and this world.
Golden Doodle
And a Golden Doodle. I see a Golden Doodle there too. Ha.
We've wanted a pup for quite some time and are really drawn to Golden Doodles. I know - they just keep gaining in popularity, and surprisingly, that isn't making me want one any less like with other things that start to get really popular.
Our perfect pup for our family is on it's way - which transitions into the next section...
The bottom left portion of my Vision Board is all about family life!
Tiny House Living
We are eager and excited to live in a Tiny House at some point. Maybe it will be mobile, maybe it will be in the backyard of another house, on a large property, or maybe it will be when The Podge Co. is up and running - whichever way - we're SO excited for it!
I particularly LOVE this one that I've shown in two images. The design is perfectly our style - plus they have a Yurt and plenty of outdoor living space as well!
Being a Hippie Mama
I'm SO excited for this day!
I've always wanted to be a Mom. When other girls dreamed of their wedding day, I dreamed of being a Mom - probably because the majority of my childhood was just me and my Mom and I LOVE the special bond that we have and probably because Gilmore Girls is my favorite show and I'm excited to replicate those kinds of bonds with my future daughter // children.
In the last several years, I've said things like, "No babies," and have felt hesitant because I guess I was a little terrified of the actual process, but I don't want those beliefs to limit the potential of our future family, so I recently let those go and am now fully looking forward to when that day comes!
I'm excited to home // world school our children and to be a SUPER Hippie Mama! I also want to recreate these two exact photos. Whoever this Mama is and whoever those children are - they are epically cute.
Going up from there we head into the Self-Care // Appearance section of my Vision Board.
Dressing in Marimekko & Kimonos
I'm all for dressing second-hand, I mean - 95%+ of my wardrobe is second-hand, AND I'm all for splurging and treating yourself in order to keep your frequency high and feeling good. For me, I look forward to the day when my small wardrobe is filled with ethical, custom pieces made by sustainable brands and tons of Kimonos & Marimekko.
I love all things Finland and Marimekko has been a favorite of mine for a LONG time. The prints in the images above are my FAVORITE - they just feel like the epitome of The Classy Hippie!
Purple Hair, Don't Care
I will continue to rock my purple hair - getting every last once of pleasure out of the experience as long as I desire to do so! I'm loving just HOW purple the purple hair in this image is and it's making me want to up-level my purple game!
Indulgent Self-Care
I've always wanted to run at least one Marathon. For so long, running has been therapeutic for me, but these last few years I've gotten out of the habit. I'm not sure of WHEN I want to bring this about and focus on it, but it's definitely a dream of mine.
We visited the particular sauna pictured here [Loyly] when we went to Helsinki last October and it was INCREDIBLE! If I could hit copy and paste - I'd plop an exact replica down here in Charlotte. I'm in LOVE with the sauna culture and look forward to having that practice be a ritual part of my self-care, as well as having one of our own on our property.
And float tanks. Never done one - REALLY want to. That's happening this year at some point. If you're so inclined to do so and want to gift me anything this year for whatever reason - a float tank session is the PERFECT gift to give to this Experience loving Minimalist.
The upper right section of my Vision Board starts to get into Travel & Experiences that I want in my life.
Going to Chile
My Mother-In-Law is Chilean and has been trying to get us to accompany her to Chile pretty much since Carl and I started dating. Hearing her talk about Chile and seeing the photos from her trips REALLY makes me want to go.
When I started actually looking into it myself in order to put a few photos on this board, the photos I found were STUNNING - I mean just look! Chile is GORGEOUS and I plan on getting there within the next two years.
Live Music, Festivals & Burning Man
Going to concerts is one of my favorite things to do - especially Classic Rock concerts! I've also always wanted to go to Burning Man and really just any music festival because I've never been to one before [can't say that anymore: hint hint.]
Attending Burning Man and a concert at Red Rocks specifically are both on my list. I wish I could have seen Tom Petty play at Red Rocks, but at this point, any Classic Rock musician will do. I've got several friends who have attended concerts at Red Rocks and they say it's probably the best concert venue there is - so yeah - that's on my list.
Next, we continue on with more Travel & Adventure...
Driving the West Coast in a Classic Black Convertible
Before Carl and I were even dating, we started planning a Road Trip together as a post-graduation trip. We chose the West Coast and started mapping out tons of buildings and projects we had learned about in school [we studied Architecture] that we wanted to see. [If that wasn't a HUGE indicator that we would end up together, I don't know what else would have been.]
We landed on starting in Seattle, making our way to Portland, through Napa Valley, to San Francisco and all along the Pacific Coast Highway until we reached San Diego. As we were planning this, we realized the trip was getting insanely beyond the budget of two post-grad college students, so we tabled it.
Since then, Carl has mentioned multiple times that he REALLY wants to do the trip in a convertible - obvs. And I really want it to be a Classic Black Car - not picky on the make and model - just something that looks like the car in the image.
NOTE: An important thing to remember when making a Vision Board is that you get to determine the time-line. For me, this board feels like a ten-year board. I don't need to feel ANY pressure to make all of this happen RIGHT AWAY. For the most part, I don't have any preference as to the order of these things happening, I just want them to happen within the next 5-10 years.
Cross-Country Year Long Road Trip
I'm SO excited to say that for the majority of our relationship, this has only been MY dream, but that now it is OUR dream to live out of an Airstream or RV and travel the US for a year! I'm extremely fortunate that I've already been to 30 states, so I included images from places I haven't been yet - although - we're definitely going to do some repeats.
The farthest west I've been is Salt Lake City and then I've been to Four Corners, so I've technically been in Arizona, New Mexico and Colorado as well as Utah, but I haven't seen much of those three states or anything else further West. I've also not made it up into many of the New England States or Hawaii or Alaska - YET.
I literally CAN'T wait for this trip! Ok. I do have a preference. I want this one to happen ASAP!
Moving right along to the top right corner, we have -- more Travel. Shocking.
Trip to Croatia
While we were planning our trip to Latvia, Estonia & Finland - we were also planning a trip to Croatia, Bosnia & Herzegovina and Montenegro. I was co-planning these two trips with a friend of ours to act as a College reunion trip where we'd put the two options up for a vote and then go on the one with the most votes.
Everyone loved the idea, but it didn't move beyond that. I really wanted to go on the Scandinavian trip that I had planned and my friend really wanted to go on the other trip that she had planned. And that's exactly what we did - ha.
So, now, I'd like to do the Croatia trip as well. It's just SO beautiful. The WORLD is just SO beautiful!
Living in Helsinki
I fell in love with Finland many years ago, which inspired the trip last October to check it out before ultimately moving there for at least a year at some point in the next 5-10 years. Helsinki and Finland in general are magical. I love EVERYTHING about them, but I'll save all of that for when I do a post on our trip.
We walked by those actual buildings in the image above and they played a big part in the inspiration for The Podge Co. branding & color palette. Also, everything in Finland is SO well designed - I just love this image of a Helsinki apartment that I found and envision living in a similar place.
Making our way down the right side of the board, we have more International Living & Saving Sea Turtles. :)
Living in Venezia [Venice] // Tuscany
Venice [and now Helsinki also] is my favorite place on Earth. It was my very first foreign city and I fell in love immediately. I love the tiny streets, bridges, stairways, hidden gardens, canals and art EVERYWHERE. The beauty is to get lost on purpose and discover along the way. Venice will always hold a special place in my heart and I want to spend some time living there at some point in the future.
I feel similarly to Tuscany. After watching Under the Tuscan Sun, I dreamed of living in a Tuscan Villa one day. On that same first trip abroad, I stayed with a family in Tuscany for a week. They lived in Prato and we could see Florence from their backyard aka olive grove. While we were in Tuscany, we went to Florence as well as Pistoia, Lucca, Pisa and a day at the beach in Viareggio. Everywhere we went was beautiful and I can't wait to live there one day.
Saving Sea Turtles & Our Planet
One of the most important things I feel called to is stewarding this planet, our environment and our resources. It's been calculated that by the year 2050, there will be more plastic in the ocean than fish if we don't start to make changes NOW. That plastic destroys sea life and kills or injures many sea creatures, including sea turtles.
After becoming a Turtle Mom myself [we have two yellow-bellied sliders, Frankie & Stanley], sea turtles really started taking hold of my heart. I've looked up trips to Cuba, and I'm sure there are other places as well, where you can help conserve sea turtle habitats and help rescue any that are in danger or who have been hurt by plastic.
I want to be a part of this solution and going on a Sea Turtle Rescue Mission is just part of that vision.
And lastly, we wrap up my board with more Travel and more Business with images of my friends Abby & Ashley, a group of Women, Norway and Morocco.
Building a Women-Focused Business with Abby
I don't want to give EVERYTHING away about this, because we haven't officially launched or announced everything yet, but we are in the process of creating a business for women - I know, super vague - but there's more to come. It will involve travel with groups of women and I'm hoping that Norway is one of our first stops, so I've included a picture of Abby, a group of women and two images of Norway to represent this dream.
Traveling to Morocco with Ashley & Friends
My friend Ashley is a beautiful soul. Her energy is magnetic and I just love everything about her. She's been to Morocco at least twice and has shared that she wants to help more people get there, with or without her AND I want to take her up on that offer! Her love of Morocco has made me love it, even before we've ever met. There's a picture of her dancing on a stone wall in Morocco and an image of a pink Moroccan building to represent this trip as well as just traveling with friends in general.
I want to make traveling with friends as commonplace as going to brunch.
Wooooo-eeeeeee. My Vision Board 100% lights me up! I'm so so so so SO excited to watch all of this unfold and transform throughout the course of my life!
Ok. But - didn't you say you were going to talk about how it started to work just 2-hours after you made your board? YES!
How My Vision Board Immediately Worked
Right after I made my board, I got on Instagram [I know, how inspiring] and as I scrolled I saw an ad for the Fleetwood Mac tour. I'd seen this ad before, but I previously thought, "That would be nice," and then dismissed it as a possibility.
This time, since going to Classic Rock concerts was fresh on my mind and since I was mentally in a place of being open to and accepting possibilities - I clicked on it. I started looking in to where the stops were and how much a ticket would cost. I made a mental note that I would make this happen no matter what because Fleetwood Mac was the only one of my favorite bands I hadn't seen yet.
Since the tickets weren't on sale yet, I made a calendar reminder for the release date so that I could purchase my ticket for when they'd be in Charlotte - then I went on about my work.
As I started to write a post, "Aerosmith. You haven't seen Aerosmith yet," popped into my head out of nowhere about 30 minutes after making my calendar reminder. This is what is known as inspired thought. When you get inspired thought - you need to act on it right away because there's something in it for you.
I thought that I had heard Aerosmith doesn't tour anymore, but instead of just accepting that, I googled just to make sure and found ONE date that they were performing for the entire year. Cinco de Mayo in New Orleans for the New Orleans Jazz Fest - in exactly one week.
Again, a part of me wanted to dismiss it as a possibility, but I kept following that inspired thought and I looked to see who else was performing and what the cost would be. I saw that Better Than Ezra & Juanes [both bring back SO many HS memories] were performing on the same day at different times, so I could see all three AND the cost for a Day-Pass was $70. $70. $70 to see Aerosmith alone is INSANE, let alone other musicians as well.
I pretty much instantly knew I wanted and needed to do this trip alone, but a part of me dismissed that as well so I started by asking Carl to join and after he declined [he had a deadline and isn't into Live music like I am] I started asking a couple of friends but when they couldn't go, I started asking everyone I came into contact with and still, no one could go.
I tried one last time by posting about it on Facebook. I told myself I wanted to do the entire trip - ticket, a place to stay, gas & food - for less than $340 and going alone would make gas and an airbnb a lot more difficult to pull that off. I assumed that I'd find a Road-Trip Buddy as the result of my Facebook post, but instead I got a free place to stay in New Orleans with the Sister-In-Law of a friend from my theater, Speech & choir days in HS.
Once that piece was in place, I bought my ticket to my FIRST music festival that I would be leaving for in just under a week. I went from Vision Board to first thing manifested in less than 2 hours!
Ok. Cool - you might be thinking - but the Vision Board didn't DO that - YOU did that. And to that I would say, YES - you're absolutely right!
Why Vision Boards Work
There's nothing mystical or magical in the images or objects THEMSELVES. They aren't alive, just waiting for you to ask them to bring things about in your life. It's much simpler than that.
What you focus on -- you create.
Just like a Designer uses a Mood Board and references it throughout a design project to guide and make sure that the feel of the brand is coming along and matching the intention they set forth in the Mood Board - a Vision Board works the exact same way, only for your life - the greatest Design project there is.
We have this thing in our brain called the Reticular Activating System, or, our RAS, and that guy does A LOT of crucial work for us. It's constantly filtering things out and causing our brain to ignore much of what goes on around us, because that much stimuli would overload us and essentially leave us immobilized.
Whenever we decide that we want something, our RAS starts to stop filtering that thing out and starts bringing it into our awareness, so that we can attain it. This is why, and I apologize that EVERYONE uses this example, when you're looking for a White 4-Door Jeep Wrangler with a Black Hard Top, you see White 4-Door Jeep Wranglers with Black Hard Tops EVERYWHERE.
Your RAS is helping you to see exactly what it is you are looking for - which is why the statements, you create what you focus on and you find what you're looking for are true and real.
When you create a Vision Board you are sending a message to your RAS that these particular things don't need to be filtered out - that you want them and that you are open to seeing them, as well as any and all possibilities that would bring them about.
THIS is why it's SO important to ACT on inspired thought. I don't know for SURE if the RAS plays a part in inspired thought - but I'm assuming it does for the reasons I've already laid out.
When you open yourself and your mind up to focusing on what you want instead of what you don't want - BIG difference - you will start to have Inspired Thoughts that by acting on them, will bring about what you want.
This is why our thoughts, words and beliefs completely control and create our life experience and this is why Vision Boards work.
Thank you SO much for reading this! I hope it inspired you to go out and make your own Vision Board, to start noticing your thoughts and limiting beliefs that are quite literally blocking you from the things that you want and to start replacing those thoughts and beliefs with ones that serve you and bring about the life that you want!
Have you ever made a Vision Board? If so, what's on it? I'd love to know!
If you haven't made one yet, what kinds of things will you put on yours? I'm excited to see how your dream life starts to unfold for you!
Love & Learning,
Genevieve
