Two years ago, I sat down with my girls to create our Family Vision Board for 2016. Guess what happened next! Definitely not what I expected!
Family is the fourth element in The Confident Mother Confidence Circle. Although most women come to me because they want help with their career or they’re feeling ‘stuck’ with how they balance work and life, of course, Family is an incredibly important element in how you get that balance.
Anyway, two years ago (so December 2015), using the prompts in Step 2 below, we decided that we wanted more fun as a family. When we moved onto Step 1, one of the pictures that we selected to represent ‘fun’ was two dogs splashing in a stream.
That got me thinking … wouldn’t it be nice to have a dog. I grew up with dogs. When I was a little girl, I wanted to marry my dog, Oaty, who was a German Shepherd. I really loved him – he was brave and handsome. Everything you could want when you’re only eight years old.
The dog in the photo is Tess – she was our second German Shepherd who joined the family after Oaty died.
However we can’t have a dog because I am often out all day with clients or away travelling. And it would limit us at the weekends, and who would look after the dog while we were on holiday. BUT …. the seed had been sown.
I started doing some research and discovered Barking Mad, a dogsitting agency. They find hosts who look after your dog when you go away, whether for the weekend or a holiday. What an amazing business idea. (Other agencies are available of course).
Instead of getting our own dog, we now dogsit on a regular basis which has brought us SO much fun which is what we wanted.
Vision boards really do work. It’s about helping your children to believe that anything is possible. What is amazing is that as we go through the year and things ‘come true’, it spurs us on “what can we do next” or “what haven’t we completed yet“.
What I have found powerful too is to include pictures of family, things that I’m grateful for, places we’ve loved, food we’ve eaten to celebrate and be thankful for what we have. It’s a way to open up to receiving even more.
(This is a great one to keep the children occupied on a “I’m bored” day in the school holidays. You can leave it until after Christmas or in the New Year however you might want to start putting aside magazines or supplements for the pictures).
Step by step to create a family vision board
Step 1 – Get the family to sit down together and talk about what you want for your family in the coming 12 months. Use these questions as prompts:
- what did we love being, doing or having in 2017
- what do we want more of in 2018
- and how do we get more of it
- what do we want less of
- what do we love to eat
- where would we love to go
- what would we love to do
Step 2 – Gather some magazines for a pool of images. You might want to gather more images from Pinterest or Google to represent what your family want to do, be or have during 2018.
Step 3 – Browse through the magazines and cut out images that represent what you want to do, be or have in 2018.
Step 4 – Find a piece of A3 or A2 card and stick the images onto the card. Make sure that every member of the family gets to select at least one image. Decorate with glitter or other stickers if you want.
Step 5 – When you have finished the Vision Board, write on the year e.g. 2018. You might want to ask your children sign or write their name on your family vision board too.
Step 6 – Hang your Family Vision Board somewhere you all see it every day. We hang ours in the front room.
Step 7 – Share your #FamilyVisionBoard on The Confident Mother Facebook page. I’d love to see yours.
Not only do I love to see what other families have done, posting it on Facebook gives gifts you an element or a token of accountability because you have shared your vision with others. And THAT act in itself is incredibly powerful. Besides, as humans, we’re naturally curious aren’t we? Do share yours – I have created a thread on the page for you to share yours using #FamilyVisionBoard.
Here are some of the ‘fun’ memories, that 2016 Family Vision Board created for me and my family (and even more here):
Do you create a #FamilyVisionBoard? If so, tell us what has come true for you and your family this year. Or tell us if you do something different too.
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