Strong Female Leaders

By Nan Nan Liu-Maffetone | Strong Female Leaders | Target Audience: work at home mommies, work at home parents

Create the highest grandest vision possible for your life, because you become what you believe. -- Oprah Winfrey

Vision Board Goals 2021

As you take down the Christmas tree and contemplate about New Year's resolutions, you begin envisioning yourself in 2021. Will you nail that project? Apply for that MBA program? Or simiply be more patient with your kids, spend more time with your spouse, and laugh, a whole lot more, about 2020? While dreams and goals are good for the soul, how can you be accountable for turning them into reality? After all, surveys show that most New Year's resolutions are left abandoned. Might a vision board be just what you need?

Simply put: a vision board is a visually pleasing, poster-sized manifestation of your goals, and it consists of various images and texts. It is useful because seeing your goals everyday makes you more likely to achieve them. A vision board offers visual reminders, as well as guidance and direction, for personal and career development. Plus, like an art project, it's fun to make. Ready to get started? Follow these steps:

**1) See far. Very very far.**

What is your lifetime vision? A vision represents your future self. So take it far and envision the end of your life. Because when you realize how brief life is, you think about what is most important to you. So take a moment and self-reflect. If you must, create various categories such as relationship, career, health and continuing education. Then, reverse engineer the vision by 30 years, 10 years, five years, three years, and finally, 2021.

2) Make contributing goals, the S.M.A.R.T way.

Goals turn vision into reality. They provide motivation, focus, and direction, and fill each day with purpose. A common and effective way to set goals is the S.M.A.R.T way:

Specific: why is this goal important? What do you want to achieve? Can you describe it in less than 20 words?

Measurable: how will you know when it is done? In other words: what is the "definition of done?"

Achievable: how realistic is the goal, based on the current constraints such as time and finance?

Relevant: how does this goal contrinute to the current vision?

Timely: by when? In a week? Six months? Can you commit to a date?

If you feel overwhelmed, start drawing a grid. Organizing convoluted thoughts into a well-laid table casts a calming effect. Here's an example:

3) Pick the visuals.

Now, get creative. You can use magazine cutouts, craft tools such as pom poms and fabric, or even crayons. The vision board is for your eyes only, so, #doyou. Do ensure that the words you choose are short and catchy and the images you use are clear, attenion-grabbing, and glossy. Make your vision board like the big commercial billboards, so the vision doesn't get lost during the day to days.

To avoid getting carried away, pick one visual and one motivational message for each goal on the board. Also, remember that this board is for next year only, so stay in scope. For example, if you want to purchase a commercial investment property, clip a picture of an office building with a "for rent" sign on the door. Then write a message that says "you own it." If you need inspiration, visually-appealing social domains such as Pinterest and Instagram help.

4) See it to believe it.

Put the vision board somewhere you can see everyday. It should be a place that is within your daily routine and right in the peripheril vision. You can also take a picture of it and set it as the background on your phone. Doesn't matter where. The point is to see it as often as possible, so that it becomes a part of you.

5) Update as needed.

As you evolve, so do your visions. By improving your visions and goals, you improve yourself. So don't be afraid to change and remove goals. Sometimes you have to let the wrong things go to allow the right things in.

Parting Thoughts

When you surround yourself with visions and goals, your dreams come alive. Designing a vision board that is unique to you also creates a sense of self, and helps you stand that much taller.

A leader not only has visions but can also clearly convey them. Lead yourself first, starting with a vision board, and those who resonate with your visions will surely join the journey.