A vision board is a collage of images, photos. words, and affirmations of your desires and future hopes. They are designed to serve as a visual source of inspiration, and motivation.
I’ve found my own recovery vision board or mood board – whatever you wish to call it, has assisted me well. I believe that thoughts really do become reality and positive energy from within yourself is very much needed. It’s hard, I know. Especially when you are in ‘that’ place in your recovery and you feel hopeless. I have been there. I know how that feels. But at the very bottom of my heart hidden exceptionally well was a small light. I would tell myself that it would all be okay – I kept it switched on, and things got better. If you are reading this, I am guessing you hold a small light of hope too – DO NOT LET IT GO OUT.
Life is tough, but so are YOU
Spiritually speaking a vision board as I like to call them, is one of the most powerful tools you can have, along with your positive thinking (I will get to that soon in positive psychology). A vision board will translate an abstract idea in your mind into something tangible, precise and clear, as you will be using your collage selected by you, and only you, it will be easier to attain your future hopes.
Create Your Vision
I have been doing this sort of thing for years, but I did not know what they were called. I’d come across vision boards watching Emma Mumford chat away about them on her YouTube channel. I’m incredibly open minded and thought I would give it a go. I’ll never regret it!
When I was in hospital I would use an audio vision technique by recording positive affirmations about myself and what I wanted to achieve on a dictaphone. So I guess back then I didn’t make an actual collage as I am advising you to do. But I did have that collage firmly glued inside my mind, and this really helped too. I would go back and listen to my recordings and notice that things had happened I had hoped for. The more grateful I felt for these achievements the better I felt – back then I did not ask for much. This technique was magic, things started to change for the better, and I needed that sort of positive vibe when I was in hospital!
We often desire things from a place of sadness. You might feel a bit low, or jealous of other people’s achievements, especially if we are recovering from trauma. We don’t feel patient and we feel unsteady about our future. BUT if you are holding on to that small light I was talking about earlier, and you tell yourself time after time that you WILL get to that point you have been hoping for, and you feel positive when you think about it, you will notice good things happening. But you must feel grateful for it and it shouldn’t come from a place of greed or negativity.
You Must Think Positive!
Nothing will change if you ask for things from a negative perspective. I have found the more negative you are the more of what you do not want will happen. For me at one time I wanted to walk again, and the more I felt cross with myself and the situation the less able I was to walk unaided. When I switched my thoughts to an ‘I will’ attitude and I felt excited and positive inside things changed!
Vision boards if anything help you to feel good about your future. They set a clear path in your mind of where you want to be. I like to call this ‘anchoring’, which is a simple term for cementing your desires in an effortless way. For instance, having a digital anchor like a photo of yourself in a way you once liked. Perhaps you are laughing with friends, playing sport, or on holiday. Whatever it is, seeing a photo on your phone daily creates that desire even more, and without even knowing it, you feel good about the image. You remember how good you felt when it was taken – exactly where you want to be.
My therapist told me to carry a photo around that I remembered being a happy time, where I felt good about myself. She told me to look at it daily more than once and think about the image, the place, the smalls and so on. This creates positive thoughts and that is healing when you are recovering from trauma. If like me you have a poor memory, you need to dig a little deeper and find that one photo you do remember and hold on to it.
Use Vision Boards To Support Others
A vision board can be a practical way of supporting someone you love who cannot make one for themselves. You can create one for them. Use happy photos of them, places they have been, friends, sports, pets, experiences, quotes, words, poems and so on. Some might think it is a waste of time. They might think it won’t help. But let me be living proof that positivity transpires from one to another, and that is magic! I think this is a great way for younger children to stay positive and feel happy if a loved one is in hospital.
Positive Psychology
With Positive Psychology we can learn how to be more resilient, hopeful, and optimistic. Not to mention feeling happier in life. If you are going through turmoil just now, Positive Psychology can help you find the right mindset to help things improve.
“The aim of Positive psychology is to catalyse a change in psychology from a preoccupation only with repairing the worst things in life to also building the best qualities in life” – Martin Seligman
Positive Psychology is a new field of psychology which studies happiness and how positive influences can make our lives better. It’s based on the principle that happiness relies on both emotional and mental factors. It is the scientific study of our personal development, strengths and success that empowers us to flourish.
This new psychology allows us to bring our memory, attention, and expectation away from negative experiences and focus on the positives to gain a balanced perspective. For instance, when I was in recovery I learnt quickly that telling myself that I couldn’t do something was coming from a negative place. When I started to tell myself I could give it another go tomorrow, I was being positive towards myself. Positive Psychology really is that simple. You must shift your way of thinking from being negative to positive, and once you start you cannot stop!
If you want to know more about anything in this worksheet, please get in touch via my contact page.
