Why you shouldn’t put your vision board away in 2024
Audio more your vibe? Listen to the podcast episode here!
I bought and read Manifest: 7 Steps to Living Your Best Life by Roxie Nafousi at the beginning of 2023. There was something Roxie mentioned in the book that really baffled me. Like, DEEPLY baffled me.
Roxie talks about putting together a vision board to house your big, dreamy goals and how you want your life to look at the beginning of each new year. She guides us through what to include, creating a ritual around it and how she likes to make hers (she writes it all out instead of using images).
And THEN?
And then - she tells us to put it away - NEVER TO BE SEEN AGAIN. (Well, for the rest of the year, at least).
Bury that beast away, walk on by and don’t look at it again until the end of the year.
The idea behind Roxie’s approach is that by doing this, you subconsciously manifest the things you truly desire and at the end of the year, you can whip your (slightly mould-enhanced) vision bb out and gaze at your January 2024 decoupage admiringly, basking in the glory of the reality that is all those pictures you cut out of a magazine actually materialising like you manifested them to do.
Don’t get me wrong, I enjoyed this book and I keep it on my bedside table as a reminder that I have more power than I think to make things happen in my own life, BUUUUUT…
Meticulously writing out (or decoupaging, if you’re a child of the 90’s like me) our hopes, dreams and holiday resort destination goals for 2024 and then sticking it at the back of wardrobe behind an empty Damp-Rid refill container and a bag of what can only be described as bits and pieces of shit we’ll never use again but keep anyway is, frankly, a one-way ticket to a little place I like to call Where Goals Go To Die.
And all good things to you if this is your jam. I mean, you do you, petal. But setting and forgetting when it comes to your vision board, your goals or how you want your life to look 12 months from now is the reason so many of us end up in goal rollover: that state where you wind up setting the same goals over and over again, year after year, without ever really feeling like you’re getting anywhere on them.
So, is the secret to achieving your goals and your vision for the way you want your life to feel really just not putting your vision board in the cupboard?
Really?
NO.
Keeping your vision board… well, visible is a great way to remind you what your goals are, but as far as helping you create a plan to actually take the steps you need to take to achieve them?
Yeah, it… it doesn’t do that.
Actually achieving your goals comes down to so much more than creating a vision board (while that IS a rad and colourfully creative way of getting your goals down on paper in visual form). Achieving your goals ain’t made of big, sweeping gestures, overnight success, going viral or participating in a movie-montage style makeover.
When I realised that changing my life and getting to where I want to be isn’t any of these things but instead, a process made up of lots and lots of small, step-by-step actions - I honestly felt like anything was possible.
The going viral effect
I used to think that achieving what I wanted to achieve (becoming an author, getting healthy, getting on top of my anxiety, creating a successful thriving business, guest appearances in episodes of Friends) was something I had to wait to be ready to do.
I had to wait till I felt like the timing was right, and when the timing was right, the change would just HAPPEN in a big, sweeping, metamorphosis and someone, somewhere would write a documentary dedicated to my overnight success.
Kinda like going viral (before going viral was a thing).
Fast forward to after I had my second baby. I started my business as a Virtual Assistant while on maternity leave from my corporate 9-5 role. Type A, Mani-Gen me got incredibly excited about building a business I could be proud of, something that would truly help others and also let me create leveraged income so I could create the life I wanted for my family.
I also just really, really enjoy creating things and I love having an outlet to make my offers, programs, content, blog posts, podcast episodes - whatever it is - come to life.
But life as a business owner with two kids under 3 (at the time I started) felt even more chaotic than it did working a 9-5 corporate role. And that was just keeping things ticking over. Doing the BARE MIN.
How on earth was I ever going to grow my business, create all the things and bring the goals I had for my business to life if I could barely find the time to service the portfolio of clients I had?
Like many solo business owners with the very lovely (but also highly impactful in terms of your time, energy and capacity) privilege of having small children in their pocket, I spent the first year (ish) living a sort of chicken-without-a-head style existence that looked something like:
Get (woken) up, get the girls ready, get us some semblance of breakfast
Drop the girls to childcare while inhaling aggressively to try and pacify myself after the catastrophic natural disaster that was getting them both in the car
Get home, start working feverishly at spreading the available hours I had as deftly as I could between my portfolio of clients
Eat things
Pick the girls up, panic about what to have for dinner and make a mental note that I really should get into meal prep
Slow descent into dinner/bed/bathtime carnage
Try to chat to my husband while thinking about the 35 things I didn’t get done today
Open my laptop again and work before flopping into bed
THE HAMSTER WHEEL OF SOLO BUSINESS OWNER LIFE
Okay, honestly - not every single day was exactly like this - but this enticing schedule was pretty damn regular.
I felt fairly rubbish about the fact that I’d started my own business with the goal (like many other women who start their own business) of creating more time, freedom and flexibility for myself and my family - without compromising on income - and while the business itself was doing well on paper, I felt like I was completely failing in relation to my goal.
It took me taking 3 weeks off at the end of the year, stepping away from my business and really taking a good, long hard look at myself to realise:
The only person who could bring my goals to life was me
The only way to bring my goals to life was to actually LIVE them
I wanted to spend more time with my kids - what the hell did that even look like? I wished I had more time for reading - so why was I scrolling on Instagram every time I had a spare minute in the day? I couldn’t see how I’d ever have the time to do the things I really wanted to do in my business like launch an online course or create a really valuable core offer, but telling myself this story repeatedly was honestly? A narrative to help me avoid what was really going on underneath.
Someone like me won’t have huge success with creating an online course because I’m not as good as everyone else out there.
‘I have no time’ is a HUGE story in our narrative - especially as mothers - BUT it’s often used to mask the beliefs we hold about ourselves beneath the surface. And YES - as a mum, you do have less disposable time. Your time and your hours are (much) harder to plan or have control over. Grappling with this stuff is very, very challenging.
When we’re working with less disposable time, we have to become really, really savvy with what we’re spending our time on. Especially if we’ve got big-ass goals we really, really want to make happen.
When I learned how to map my goals for my life and my business by quarter, month, week and even down to the day - my life (HONESTLY) completely changed.
And I actually started to feel like I was living my goals.
For me, this does not happen if I create a beautifully aesthetic vision board (or even just a paper list) of goals for the year, look at it admiringly and then stuff it away on a shelf and never look at it again.
If you have goals for the year (or even the next 5 years): START LIVING THEM. Weave your goals into the hours you have in your day.
Here’s an example of what this looks like for me this year:
GOAL: Spend more time with my kids in 2024
MONTHLY ACTIONS:
Diarise a monthly early pick-up from daycare
Diarise a fortnightly 1:1 date for each of my kids on a weekend day
Diarise weekly meal planning or prep time to streamline dinner process
WEEKLY ACTIONS:
Complete weekly meal planning/prep at scheduled time
Grocery order to make sure we have food in the house
DAILY ACTIONS:
Spend 15 minutes at lunch time prepping dinner for that evening (so after pick-up I can spend some time with the kids versus cooking, sweating and stressing for 45 minutes)
Wake up 15-30 mins before kids to shower and get ready (ties in with one of my other goals, but more on that later)
This might be completely out of alignment with your goals, or what you see as achievable for your life, but I wanted to illustrate how SUPER IMPORTANT AND LIFE CHANGING the process of actually translating your goals into lived actions really is when it comes to achieving them.
So, pals, as you stare down the barrel of 2024:
If the January glow has already started to replace itself with a vague sense of panic, if you’re questioning how the hell you’re going to find the time to achieve ANY of the goals you set for yourself - try ditching the word ‘achieve’ and replacing it with the word ‘live’.
Let this post inspire you to think differently and creatively about those little actions you could take every day, week, month to actually LIVE your goals and bring them to life.
And LIVE that decoupage vision board loud and proud, pals.
