Creating A Vision Board

No wrong way, but here are a few suggestions

I’ve had trouble writing this over the last few weeks, hence the radio silence from me. Why? Because making vision boards requires images, and magazines are so damn expensive nowadays. I couldn’t, in good conscience, ask my readers to go and spend a ton of jang on some pubs that you’re just going to rip up for a collage. But then I realized you may have magazines lying around, or be able to print out images on your computer…so there you have it.

I’ve been making vision boards for decades. These are collages I make, usually in the first few weeks of January, with my hopes, dreams, intentions on them for the coming year.

A vision board I made in 2016.

I am a certified SoulCollage facilitator — which concentrates more on cards you create — but I learned about vision boards from a SoulCollage teacher when I still lived in New Hampshire, over 20 years ago.

One of the first suggestions she gave was NOT to use words on the board. It’s very tempting to express ourselves in the way we know — through language — but finding an image that encapsulates our intentions is both a little more creative and supposedly taps into a different part of our brain, which helps move energy around and is more conducive to manifesting our desires.

2017. “Health, wealth, and family happiness.”

Another suggestion is to first cut out backgrounds (National Geographic is the best for this, in my opinion). Cover the white page, even if you are then going to cover the backgrounds with other images. It’s like making a bed, and the backgrounds are the sheets. You then get to lie in the bed, and dream your big dreams.

2019. “Romance, magic, and travel.”

Also, if you can and want to, you can print out images from your own life — people you love, places you work, houses you have lived in.

2024. “To cultivate patience and realign with my own creativity.”

Treat this as a sacred time. If you can get together with a few friends around a kitchen table, do that. Put on ambient music. Treat each image with respect (and remember, when you are drawn to an image, always check the back of it! There may be an answer there to a hidden question.)

You don’t need to set an intention — your images may do it for you! You can always make the vision board and then ask it what message you need to derive from it. And guess what? You can always make another one.

Here’s to going into the new year with hope and love.