Can vision boards work even for cynics?!

I just randomly came across this clip.

It seems that Oprah actually granted Ellen DeGeneres’ wish! Not only that, Ellen was delighted. Turns out she really wanted to get closer to Oprah.

As a result, she ended up being interviewed on the show.

Is this proof that vision boards work even if you don’t believe in them?

Oprah’s approach to this is just great. Most people would have been really annoyed that someone was taking the mickey out of them. They would either ignore it and store up bad feeling or retaliate in an angry way.

Instead, Oprah completely turns it around!

That’s it. The evidence is in. Vision boards work. Even if you don’t believe in them – or start off thinking you shouldn’t believe in them!

Make one anyway and see what happens.

Vision boards – what’s the case for and against?

Today I’ve come across two very different clips about vision boards. One for, one against (sort of).

It made me think of a question. Do vision boards work or not? Are they worthwhile and life-changing or just silly and pointless?  What do you think?

The case ‘for’: Clip one shows John Assaraf telling his story of how he got his dream home by using a vision board. John is very successful, well known and wealthy, and he puts much of this down to vision boards. In the clip, he shows us his home and the vision board in question. The house is, it has to be said, stunning.

The case ‘against’: Clip two shows comedian Ellen DeGeneres satirising Oprah’s well-document love of vision boards. Ellen is very successful, well known and wealthy, but it doesn’t seem like she is into vision boards. Or maybe she isn’t actually ‘against’ them – it’s just satire. Who knows. Anyway, it’s quite funny. And it sort of reminds you not to get too serious about this stuff, I think.

It made me think that having a balanced discussion about vision boards is important. Because that’s how we learn.

I’ve edited the ‘Experiment’ page to invite people to try making a vision board to see if it works for them…or not. I’d like to have honest feedback, not just positive comments. A mixture would be good and, I think, helpful. You can probably guess which camp I’m in. But we all have times when we struggle to focus on what we want and I think sharing that would be a good thing.

What is the case for and against vision boards? What are the problems we can come up against? Are there ways to overcome them?

Would be interested to hear your thoughts.

“All of this is airy fairy nonsense!”

I’ve been reflecting on this phrase which I used in the last post about my dream board. This is something which comes up a lot for me and I’d be interested to know if it is also true for others. My hunch is that is probably is.

One of the main things I worry about is what people will think if they ‘find out’ that I’m interested in this sort of thing. As you can see, at the moment I’m anonymous. I’m not alone in this, I’ve been using a great forum (here’s a plug www.stevepavlina.com) and my impression is that the only people who tend to reveal their identities work in this field ie life coaches etc. This probably isn’t entirely the case but I think it’s a general trend.

Then there’s my internal ‘critic’ who says: “What are you doing wasting your time on this? It’s all ‘airy fairy’ nonsense/it’s weird/you’re just trying to escape from reality etc etc.” Or ‘blah blah blah’. It really does like the sound of its own voice, it’s just unfortunate that it has set up camp inside my head.

Of course everyone has an inner critic. I’m no expert but I assume this is the product of things we’ve been told by others during our lives, in particular during our childhoods. It’s also there to protect us against certain things, maybe from an evolutionary point of view. So if we were to suddenly feel compelled to go out into the street naked (could happen!) it would say: “Stop, don’t do that. You will look stupid and probably end up in prison, lose your job and friends etc.” That is quite useful. What isn’t useful is when it can’t get out of the habit and tries to stop us doing things which could enhance our lives if we can just push through the fear. Like getting a new job, or moving to a new place, or doing something new just because we want to and feel it will broaden our minds and experience.

I suppose if your mind has been used to thinking in a certain way for your entire life, new ideas can sometimes be threatening. This can particularly be the case, I think, with religious ideas which tend to be quite entrenched especially if you have learnt them at an early age when your character is being formed. I don’t think that religious and spiritual ideas are bad, far from it, but I think it’s good to be aware of the fact that we could be constrained by exploring different areas of spirituality by our conditioning.

Now when I notice the phrase coming up, I just laugh and take it in a light-hearted way and then focus on what I really do want. I remind myself of all the amazing people who do believe in this ‘airy fairy nonsense’ and the fact that focussing on positive, fun things, is a much better way to spend your time than focussing on the negative which just makes you feel terrible.

This is an excellent book about fear which was recommended to me by the amazing coach Kathryn Entwistle and which I have just suggested in the forum above for someone struggling with these ideas: ‘Feel the Fear and Do it Anyway’ by Susan Jeffers. I have also suggested that they watch/re-watch ‘The Secret’. I especially like the part about John Assaraf’s vision boards but as you can see, I am slightly interested in dream boards (obsessed?). Not sure why, it just works for me!

Oh yes and something else truly amazing has happened to me this morning. I won’t post it on here as it involves a specific person who is quite well-known and very inspiring indeed but hopefully I can post something in the future.

NUMBER 2

from The Dreamer, Manchester, England

From The Dreamer, Manchester, England

I put my dream board together really instinctively. There’s a quiet room in the house where I can go and write and that sort of thing so I chose a time when I wouldn’t be interrupted. Someone had told me that it’s important to get into the right frame of mind so I lit a couple of candles and put on some music which inspires me. I got together a pile of magazines covering a range of topics so the photos would be varied including Health& Beauty, Easy Living, Homes and Gardens, Psychologies and newspaper mag supplements.

Then I just started flicking and chopping. Now and again I fancied a photo but the ‘critic’ voice in my head which says all of this is airy fairy nonsense (we’ve become quite well-acquainted of late) would tell me it was ‘wrong’ or there was ‘no point’. I ignored it on purpose and cut it out anyway. Then at the end I laid all the pictures out and looked for gaps in different parts of my life. So there were lots and lots of spas and yoga pictures (I was having quite a bad time at work at the time. Also I am a sucker for a nice spa) but nothing about money. This is an area I tend to be a bit scared of so I purposely added an image with sums and hearts and a yellow piece of paper (my favourite colour) with ‘Money’ written on it surrounded by £££s. I added other bits of paper with words written on them as well to balance this out. The words which came to mind were: Love, Beauty, Joy, Peace.

I left it all for a few days then before coming back and starting to arrange the pictures. I did this a few times over about a week before sticking them down. I chose a big piece of card and left spaces so that I can add more as this feels right to me. When it came to arranging the pictures I just went with my instinct again and enjoyed doing that.

The result was very pleasing. I felt a wave of excitement in my stomach. Every day after that I spend say five minutes, sometimes less even just a quick look if I was busy, looking at it and really feeling the images. Some days I looked more at individual pictures. There’s a picture of a boat with a paradise island in the background with the words ‘Splendid Isolation’. There is a picture of a woman meditating by a lake. There are two women running along a beach which especially appealed to me. I had also chosen people playing musical instruments. I didn’t know why but just went with it. The words ‘Changed my life’ and ‘Creating the me I want to be’ leapt out at me a lot. Other days I would look at the whole, just breathe it in. I felt an amazing calm and optimism doing this. I think it works because it is just perfect for me. I created it. No-one else could have done.

Here are the results so far. As above, it immediately made me a feel a lot better and more optimistic and focussed on what I wanted in life. Not in a specific sense as such, but in terms of the feeling I want more of in my life – calm, peace, relaxation, health. Also in terms of some of the things which make me feel happy – the sea, yoga/spas/running, books, healthy food.

Now that’s all very nice and lovely etc and it would be fine if it ended there. What has happened though is that really from nowhere during the last few weeks I’ve been able to leave a job I wasn’t enjoying, a person who was making my life very difficult has been removed from it, the time and resources have just appeared to help me feel much happier and healthier, and most amazingly of all I am going to live overseas in an amazing place beyond my wildest dreams by the sea with all set-up expenses paid.

So basically if you are feeling unhappy with your life or even if you’re on the right track but want to speed up realising your dreams, give this a try. And please do let me know how you get on!

You could be amazed.

The Dreamer.