Creating the Vision Board of Your Dreams
I’ve been refusing to throw away any magazines for, like, eight months with the intention of creating a vision board for myself, so what better time than the start of the new year?
Some people will argue against vision boards, saying that visualizing only the end goal makes you lazy to do the actual work to get there, or that seeing your goals every day desensitizes you to them. Being cognizant of these possible shortcomings, I made sure that my vision board included a lot of intentions, almost like a mood board. As a visual learner, I always appreciate being able to see something if I want to commit it to memory.
You will need:
A “board”. This can be a poster board, a sheet of paper, or a frame. I love this floating frame because it will integrate better into my bedroom decor so I can display my vision board all the time.
A “vision”. You need pictures of things that represent your goals, intentions, and vibe! I hung on to magazines for a while and cut pictures from them. You can also use a computer and printer to find specific images. Either one will work, or a combination of the two!
Scissors and glue to put it all together.
Start with an idea of the things you want on your vision board. If you have specific goals, you may want to write a list of things you want to be sure to include. For my own vision board, I wanted to convey more of an intention than my tangible goals. I knew that I wanted my board to make me feel happy, confident, and motivated, and to remind me what my priorities are.
I started by cutting a piece of scrapbook paper to the size I wanted to fit in my floating frame. If you are using regular paper or poster board, you don’t need to do this. If you are using a frame, you can use a separate piece of paper, or just use the insert that came with your frame.
Next, I flipped through my stack of magazines, looking for anything that called out to me. I cut out pictures and words that matched the feelings I wanted my board to convey. I cut out evvvverything I liked. I just kind of roughly cut around things without worrying about them being perfect.
Once I had a pretty solid pile of happy little clippings, I took the bigger pieces and laid them out on my base paper, playing with them until I found a layout I liked. Before I glued them down, I cleaned up their cut edges. (Since I cut out a ton of pieces, I didn’t want to waste time meticulously cutting out pieces I wouldn’t end up using.) One of the reasons I wanted to use a floating frame was so that I could create extra dimension by letting some pieces of the design hang over the edges. I think it adds a little extra bit of playfulness to the casual collage style.
After getting the larger “background” pieces down, I sorted through all of the smaller pictures and words I had cut out and pulled out my favorites. Then I did the same thing as before, laying out the smaller clippings to cover up the empty spaces and the seams between the “square” background pieces. Make sure you change up the sizes and colors of the pieces that are close together so that they don’t all blend together. I finished my vision board off with the smallest of my clippings (do you spy the heart cookies and tiny strawberries?), made sure the glue was dry, and popped it into it’s frame.
A lot of the ads in my magazines had the year in them, so I cut out a little “2020” and stuck it in the corner. Hopefully, I can make my vision board a yearly tradition and eventually be able to look back on old ones to reminisce and gauge my progress. At the end of this year, I will probably pull this collage out of the frame and use it as the front page of my 2020 scrapbook.
Creating a vision board is a fun project to focus your mind on the things you want to accomplish. This would also be super fun activity to do with friends to celebrate the New Year. Not only would you have your own cute little reminder for yourself, but you’ll have friends on the same page that can encourage each other and cheer for one another as you each get closer to reaching those milestones.
I’ve never made a vision board before, but I love the way it turned out. It will be a super cute addition to my bedroom decor and a sweet reminder of how I want the year to go. It’s caught my eye at least once a day since I’ve made it and I definitely think its helping me maintain my positive mindset and keep my attention on my priorities.
