How to make a vision board without magazines.
Anyone who’s ever listened to Steve Harvey or Oprah Winfrey has probably heard about the concept of vision boards.
When some people think about vision boards, they think of high school students putting together a collage of photos for a school project.
In other words, a lot of people don’t take them very seriously.
But here’s the thing.
Vision boards are actually incredibly powerful.
And if you want to achieve success for yourself in life, then it’s in your best interest to not only learn about them, but to also deploy them as you pursue success for yourself.
I’m a huge proponent of dreaming big dreams, turning your dreams into goals, and then using those goals to create a roadmap to success that you can achieve one step at a time.
This is truly the key to achieving the life you want.
And a vision board fits perfectly into this framework.
One thing that has historically always been a part of creating vision boards is magazine clippings.
Back in the day, magazines were an easy-to-obtain source of beautiful high-resolution images that you could cut out and glue or tape onto a vision board to help you flesh out your vision.
However, nowadays, this doesn’t work out quite so well.
Far fewer people actually subscribe to magazines—and some of them are actually getting really expensive.
Most media is moving online.
Plus, with magazines becoming more and more of a ‘collector’s item,’ it’s also true that you may not want to cut them up anymore.
So with that being said, we’re left with a very specific question.
How to make a vision board without magazines.
This is why you’re here.
So let’s jump into it.
What Is A Vision Board?
Interestingly enough, the term ‘vision board’ doesn’t actually appear in the dictionary.
This is because it’s made up of two different words that have different meanings.
With that being said, Merriam Webster did publish an article about it as a word that they’re watching.
This just goes to show you that more and more people are thinking and talking about vision boards than you probably realize.
Here’s a loose definition for what the term ‘vision board’ really means.
Vision Board: A collage of words and images that literally or metaphorically represents the things you desire in life.
See, vision boards are important because they help you to piece together a picture of how you’d like your life to look.
They help you to visualize the things that you want.
This is so powerful.
Along with writing down your goals, visualizing the outcome is crucial to success—and vision boards give you a powerful method for doing this in everyday life.
So let’s talk about how you can go about making a vision board without cutting up those expensive vintage magazines of yours.
4 Simple Steps For How To Make A Vision Board Without Magazines
1. Make A List Of Things You’d Like For You Future
Vision boards can start with images or with words.
However, I’ve always found it extremely convenient to start them off by writing down a list of things I wanted for myself.
You can do this in a notebook, on your computer, in a goal planner, on your tablet, or even on regular stationery.
The key is just to write down some ideas for things you’d like to have and/or accomplish.
For example, you could write down ideas like:
- I want to have a big house with three bathrooms.
- I want to be able to afford to send all of my kids to college.
- I want to help 100 people start new businesses.
- I want to create a computer program that brings millions of people enjoyment on a daily basis.
- I want to get in shape.
- I want to help my family grow closer together.
The list could go on and on.
Just identify the things you really want in life, and start writing them down.
It doesn’t have to be super specific at first (though being as specific as possible is awesome).
You can think of small things or big things, whatever you want.
Personally, I’m a big fan of dreaming big dreams.
So if you’re going to do it, I say go all the way and dream as big as possible.
2. Add To It As You Get More Specific About Your Future Vision
One thing about your future vision is that it’s absolutely going to evolve and change as you move through life.
As you continue your journey, you’re going to realize that your specific vision of the future is going to shift a bit—and this is absolutely 100% normal.
Your vision board may change as you accomplish things on it.
Or you may realize (after some time and reflection) that specific parts of it aren’t really relevant to you anymore.
That’s totally fine.
As you go through the journey, regardless of what stage your vision board is in, don’t be afraid to make changes.
In fact, you should make changes on a daily basis—as long as they reflect your true desires.
3. Source Images For Your Vision
This is the part where the Internet can be your best friend.
One of the great things about the internet is that there are pictures of pretty much anything you can imagine on it.
Now, you’ve got to be careful.
You don’t want to infringe on anyone’s copyright or get yourself into a situation where you’re using images that belonged to someone else in an illegal manner.
So in other words, don’t go and download pictures and sell them or use them to generate income.
However, you can use images for personal use.
Search for images of the things you want in life.
Find some images that look awesome to you.
Download those images into a file and store them for your vision board.
For example, I have a goal-setting student who dreams one day of building himself and his family a castle.
He literally wants to build a massive house out of stone, so that he and all of his family can live in it together.
This is one of his big life goals that he wants to accomplish for the future—and he put this right in the middle of his vision board.
For inspiration, literally joined some Facebook-themed groups where people would share images of castles all over the world, and hunted down the perfect version of the castle he wants to build in his future.
He downloaded it, printed it out, and put it on his vision board.
And it inspires him literally every single day.
He hasn’t accomplished it yet, but he’s well on his way.
He’s already started two businesses, and is quickly moving along the path that he’s written out in his long-term goals.
In other words, he’s on track to make it.
Doesn’t that sound awesome?
Well, you can do the exact same thing.
4. Put These Images Together To Create A Fully Fleshed-Out Vision Board
Now it’s time to do the fun work.
Print out those images and/or put them into some kind of a program, and get to work completing your vision board.
Now, there are many different ways that you can do this.
And I’ve got a few ideas that I’m going to drop here just to give you a little inspiration.
1. Google Docs
Google Docs makes it easy to put together simple collages of images.
Now, this isn’t a graphic editing software—so it can only get so fancy.
But if you need something free, fast, and efficient just to get you by, for now, this is a great place to start.
Insert your images into the Google Doc, shape them as necessary, turn it into a printable PDF—and there you have it
2. Canva
Canva is a very user-friendly graphics design software that’s all browser-based.
You can literally use it on your smartphone.
You don’t have to download anything.
And the free version gives you everything you need to create a beautiful vision board.
You can create it as large as you want, or as small as you want.
You can put images together, put filters on the images, add text, add extra graphics, use banners, etc.
Whatever you want.
Personally, this is my favorite way to create a vision board.
In fact, one idea is to create a massive vision board on Canva and then to take that file into your local print shop and have them print you out a huge poster that you can hang up on your wall.
This isn’t even that difficult, and will require very minimal research on your part.
Just make sure you’re getting the dimensions close to right, and you should be good to go.
Aside from that, it’s all creativity and awesomeness.
3. Print And Create
If you’re old school, you may prefer to buy yourself a big poster and just tape or paste images onto the poster—thus, creating a vision board by hand.
This is awesome.
Plus, it’s simple to do.
You can simply print out photo quality images of the pictures you want to apply, cut them out, and literally tape or paste them right onto your background as needed.
You can use foam board to create a vision board that’s got some vertical strength to it, or you could use something like craft paper so that you can make it large, hang it up, etc.
You could even do this on a bulletin board, and use thumbtacks.
If you end up accomplishing something on your vision board or wanting to change it, easy…
Just remove it or cover it up with another picture.
Remember—this project is completely 100% for you. As long as you love it and it inspires you every day, that’s all that matters.
4. Create A Banner
If you create a beautiful image on Canva, you can easily take it to a banner shop and then have them print it out into a massive banner to hang up on your wall.
This is a little bit more expensive—and in some cases, it could be considered overkill.
But hey, go big or go home, right? What an awesome way to make a vision board without magazines, without sacrificing quality, size, or inspiration!
Conclusion
Hopefully, this post has given you some useful information that’ll help you with the question of how to make a vision board without magazines—and how this can help you in your goal-setting and life-success journey.
Of course, at the end of the day, this is just another part of the larger, overarching process of turning your dreams into goals, and writing those goals down to create a roadmap for success in your life.
This is how you begin your journey to success and crush it.
Need some help? Download my weekly goal-setting sheet, print out a few, and give it a try.
You can also sign up for my email list to get a free copy of my Goal Setting Essentials Starter Kit.
You’ve got this. I believe in you.
Now it’s time to get to work.
Best wishes…
Jay O’Donnell