If you want to transform your life and transform your relationship, creating a vision board with your partner is a great start!
I’ve previously written a detailed ‘How To’ for creating a vision board that actually works for an individual.
But shortly after becoming a mum I had a strong desire to create a new vision board with a twist. I felt the need to collaborate with my husband so we could create a shared vision for our life and our new little family.
This was a really fun, insightful and powerful process and I thought I’d share all the details so you can do the same!
(N.B. I did a pretty extensive Google search trying to find other articles on how to team up with your partner to create a vision board but I found nothing – so I really hope this epic post is helpful!).
The process of creating a vision with your partner helps you to gain clarity around exactly what you want out of life both as an individual and as a couple.
Often we have quick and maybe even flippant conversations with our loved ones about our futures and joke about our wishes. But making the space and prioritising this activity provides you with the opportunity to have a serious, (and fun!), conversation about your big dreams for your life together.
I know in the past James and I have had these discussions about creating our ideal life but they’ve usually taken place when we are on holidays and in an expansive and positive mood.
Is it just me, or do you always feel more open and optimistic when you’re on vacation, overlooking a spectacular view with a cocktail in hand?
But once the ‘happy hours’ end and your holiday is over, you go back to your everyday life and these discussions are usually forgotten. As a result, that lovely clarity you once had about your dream life is lost in the happenings of your everyday.
Creating a vision board with your partner may sound like a fun little DIY craft project you can do on the weekend, but it actually has a much greater purpose.
To make things easy for you I’ve created a PDF Download where I share all the pivotal questions you and your partner need to answer BEFORE you start crafting your vision board.
It’s a really great starting point and will help spark your imaginations and bring you closer to creating a vision for your life that inspires and excites both of you!
Download Below!
Just jump over to my FREE STUFF and select the ‘How To Create A Vision Board As A Couple’ resource. (P.S. you’ll also receive access to ALL of my free coaching resources).
These questions have been crafted to deepen your connection to what YOU want and how you want to feel, what your PARTNER wants and how he/she wants to feel and what you as a COUPLE want to create, experience, achieve together and how you want to feel as a partnership.
These aren’t things that you usually discuss over breakfast, so sitting down and creating a vision board together is the perfect opportunity to get to know what you and your partner want out of life.
Have fun dreaming BIG together!
Sharing and declaring publicly, what you want to be, do and have as an individual and as a couple helps to keep you accountable.
Also, this process can bring you closer together and you’ll find joy in supporting and cheering each other on achieving your individual and partnership goals and dreams.
Accountability and cheerleading also accelerate the likelihood of taking inspired action, which is exactly what you need in order to achieve that transformation that you’re hungry for.
There’s no point having a heap of pretty pictures and inspiring quotes stuck on a board if you’re not willing to do the work in order to achieve it!
You now understand why it’s important and the benefits of creating a vision board as a couple.
Below I step out the powerful yet simple process of creating your own shared vision board.
If you’re anything like me you would’ve read the header ‘do it in stages’ and been like ‘WHHAAAT?’
I hear you!
I’m all about instant gratification and I usually get in there and get X,Y,Z done!
BUT… rushing in and creating a quick sticks vision board with your partner isn’t going to be that effective.
Here’s why…
You need time to first share, discuss and agree on what you want in your life etc. etc. and then you need to find fantastic and inspiring images that represent this for you.
In my opinion and experience, this can’t be done in one sitting. Just saying!
If you’re familiar with my coaching work you’d know that the Beautiful You coaching model is very much ‘feelings based’…and I LOVE this!
You see there’s no point saying “I want to climb an active volcano” when you haven’t connected it to your WHY and how this will make you feel.
I’ll use my husband for example.
A dream he shared was to climb an active volcano (first I’d heard of it, but what ever!). I asked him why? At first he wasn’t sure and then he told me “it just sounds cool.” I then proceeded to ask him how it would make him FEEL?
You see, the grand idea of climbing a volcano ‘because it sounds cool’ isn’t going to motivate my husband to train for this experience nor is it going to help him literally reach the summit of a volcano. This is because he’s relying on external validation (opinions of others) to motivate him rather than connecting with how this dream/goal will make him feel.
That’s why you both need to sit down and take some time to think about and explore how you want to feel on a day-to-day basis.
This is what we did:
It’s a good idea to give your vision board a timeframe.
But it’s not so much the time element that it’s important. The key is that you’re both on the same page in terms of timelines and your expectations around making your vision a reality!
There’s no point having a picture of a house pinned to your board when YOU think you’ll purchase one this year and your partner thinks it’s a part of your five year plan.
You could have a vision board for 2017 or a board that represents the next 2, 5, 10 years.
As long as you and your partner are happy and on the same wave length, it’s simply up to you!
(I’ll admit that our board is a little all over the place in terms of time frames. For example certain holidays are short term goals and purchasing a house by the beach is a long term goal).
I like structure and having your vision board divided into specific categories can really help you get clear on how you want your life to unfold.
Specific categories can include:
Again it’s up to you as a couple to decide on which categories really work for you.
James and I chose to work with Travel, Health and Fitness, Education and Hobbies, Family/Home and Material Possessions. (Just an FYI – our images and categories are all mixed together but it’s what works for us. You can use the categories as a guide and to spark ideas).
You now have your ‘life categories’ for your vision board, so let’s get specific for each category.
You first need to go back to your ‘feeling words’ and relate them to each of your vision board categories.
For example, ‘Abundance’ is one of our shared feelings which relates to our Travel category. One of the specific holidays we want to take is to New York and Boston to visit dear friends….this makes us feel abundant, so we have pictures of these places on our vision board.
Now that you’re clear on how you want to feel as individuals and as a couple, you’ve discussed a timeframe for your vision and decided on life categories that resonate, it’s now time for the fun part!
Grab a heap of different magazines, photos, inspiring quotes and start cutting and sticking, pinning gluing….what ever works for you!
My advice is to go nuts and cut out any image that really speaks to you and then cull. It’s better to have too many pictures and then you can choose your favourites to pin to your board.
I also like to include a photo of us as a couple looking happy and relaxed.
The picture we’ve included is us having an amazing dinner at The Banyan Tree in Bangkok. Plus, we’ve also included a picture of the three of us as a little family 🙂
You’ve now crafted an amazing vision for you life as a couple – it’s time to make it as visible as possible!
It’s important that you place your vision board somewhere that gets a lot of eyeball traffic from both you AND your partner.
We have hung our vision board in our bedroom and we can see it when we first wake up in the morning and the last thing before bed.
It may work better for you placed on your fridge, your lounge room wall or your bathroom mirror.
Keeping your vision top of mind will help to imprint it into your being and make it even more vivid and meaningful for you both.
I thought I would share from experience….i.e. my mistakes
It’s important that you actually set up a dedicated time to sit down, talk through your dreams and desires and then start creating.
We completed ours over a few weekends because we wanted to make sure that we were being intentional with what we were putting on our dream board….plus having a newborn complicates things a bit!
So clear your calendar and get excited! You want to ensure that both you and your partner are in a positive headspace and have the time, energy and willpower to craft your vision.
Creating a vision board together really does require teamwork (Ha! Who would have thought!).
Now I know I can be a tad bossy with James and I definitely know that I’m a control freak and a perfectionist.
But I had to be mindful that this is OUR dream board and that I had to be open in how we undertook the process and the creation of our vision board…which meant listening and sometimes doing things his way ha ha!
Remember, “Cooperation makes it happen!”
If your partner isn’t as keen and enthusiastic as you to get all DIY on your dream board then my advice is to lead by example.
Your first reaction may be to nag and coax your partner into opening up and sharing their dreams….however this doesn’t work!
Use the FREE Resource Guide to answer the questions yourself, then share them with your partner. This will dovetail nicely into you answering them together as a couple.
Creating a vision board with a loved one actually requires a certain amount of vulnerability.
It’s not everyday that you sit down and dive into thought provoking questions about how you want to live your life!
So don’t be alarmed if you hear things that surprise you or may seem quite absurd….in fact, you need to be open to this and in some cases, expect it!
For example James shared some pretty ‘interesting’ life dreams with me and I made the mistake of laughing as I thought he was joking! (It doesn’t help that he is always joking about things!).
But my advice is to be open to what ever your partner shares as it can take a lot of guts to share big dreams!
AND drum roll…..
Here’s our completed vision board that is hung on our bedroom wall!
Download the ‘How To’ guide below as I’ve also included a checklist for you with everything we used and where you can source certain materials online!
I hope you found this post interesting and inspiring! I also hope you’re now keen to grab your partner and start discussing how you want to live your lives to the fullest!
If you have any questions about how we created our vision board as a couple, feel free to share your questions in the comment section below! I’d love to hear from you!
Ainslie x
