Getting Clear on What You Want

There’s no question that creating a vision for your life is one of the most powerful things you can do. It’s also one of the exercises that the women in our Women Rising Program find the most challenging.

It can be quite confronting when you start to do this work for a few reasons. You might find that you don’t have a vision for your life or haven’t thought about it for a long time. Maybe you’ve been following someone else’s vision without even realising it, and living your life based on their agenda. Or you may be like so many women and have been so busy spending your time taking care of everyone else’s needs that you’ve never taken the time to sit down and ask yourself what you want for yourself.

Recognising these things can bring up a lot of conflicting emotions, and also feelings of guilt for putting ourselves first. Even though this work is confronting, what we also know to be true is that when you take the time to slow down, pause, reflect and write down what it is that you truly want for your life, it’s amazing what that level of clarity can bring.

So carve out some time and space for yourself and follow this 4-step process to create your vision.

Step 1: Create Clarity

The first step is about finding clarity and defining what you want — and as importantly, getting clear on what you don’t want.

What do you want for your life?

What would you want most if you gave yourself permission?

Write down the things that are most important to you in your life and write freely about the things you would like to have in your life in 2024.

Think about your family life, friends, work, creativity, spirituality, community, well-being, relaxation, finances, hobbies, home life, vacations, charity, activism, romantic and social life. What would it all look like?

Step 2: Emotionally Fuel the Vision

Take the list you’ve written of things that are the most important to you and pick one thing you’d like to bring into your life and start to emotionally fuel that vision.

For example, if you want to create more balance in your life, ask yourself what balance would look like for you. What would balance feel like in your life? How would you live your day? What time would you get up? What would you eat? When would you work? What elements would be present that would make you feel like you were living in balance?

Sit with that and sit with how that would feel in your body.

You can pick one thing after the other and go through this exercise to start to bring the emotion into it. How would it feel if you actually moved forward and created that in your life?

Step 3: Get Creative

We know from positive psychology and neuroscience that positive images pull us forward. That’s why you hear so many people talking about the power of visualisation. We hear athletes talk about it all the time. It’s why we use things like vision boards, so that we have a constant visual reminder of what it is we’re trying to create.

Your next step is to create a visual representation of your vision and the core elements that you have written down. You can use a journal, an online tool like Pinterest or Canva, or a vision board. Start to visually create this life that you want to live. Pull out pictures from magazines and write down words or sentences. Put your values on the board.

Step 4: Start Bringing Your Vision to Life

Now that you have some more clarity, pick one thing from your vision list and find a small way to bring it into your life each day for one week. For example, if it’s creativity that you’ve identified you want to bring more of into your life, then give yourself a 30-minute window once a week and do something creative, whatever that looks like for you.

We often feel like we need to change our whole life in a minute and not only is it not possible, it’s way too much pressure. So pick one thing and start to bring that in for a week. And then you can start to add other things in.

So there you have it. A simple 4-step process to create your life vision.