Mid - Year Vision Boards
My personal and professional vision board and why this vision board so important to me.
Most people create their vison boards within the months of December and January and although this is not new to most, recently I decided to do things a bit different. Every year we celebrate a new lease on life during our birthdays. It’s a time to reflect, visualize and map out new goals and an opportunity to hold ourselves accountable; so, for me this was the perfect time for me to create a vision for what and where I wanted to see myself grow and tackle new challenges. With the help of my friend, this past Sunday we scoured through magazines for inspo that would tell the story of my life for the 2018–2019 year and serve as a reminder of what I was working so hard to build.
I wanted my vision board to be placed where I couldn’t help but see it every day, pray over it, allow it to guide me so I put it right in front of my bed; so, every single morning when I wake up it is literally the first thing I see. Some people put a time frame on their goals and although that is good in most cases, I wanted my board to reflect both long and short term goals that I could build on over the years.
Now, I won’t go into grand details of everything that’s on my board, however I will let you know that when selecting what I put on the board, I wanted to be very clear on what it meant for me and the internal goal it created.
I focused heavily on my blog and its evolution over the next year (and beyond). For me, CanCanOnWheelz is not just a blog, it is a platform for MULTIPLE ventures. I recently told my friend, I don’t want to just write about how I want to change the conversation on the disabled community and representation, I want to actually change it. I want to be a true change agent and this is not accomplished by typing on a keyboard.
My goal is to reach larger audiences, help change policy and media stereotypes. I want to see more positive, educated representation.
Let’s take a look at my board,
I placed the words “Worldwide Bestseller” on my board to encourage me to keep telling my story so that one day my story will reach people from all over the world, in various forms… one being by book! For so many years I never thought I had a story to tell, nothing exciting or glamorous but what I’ve come to realize is… it’s not all about the glitz and glamour but the story is in the simple fact that you did it, that is the success! I may have not made all the smart moves but I made moves. Each move teaching a better strategy for the next critical move. I want my story to speak of dignity and real work. Obviously, before the book comes panels, conferences centered on putting the disabled community at the top of the conversation, not the back-end or worse… not even in the conversation.
As you can see I have travel ALL OVER MY BOARD! Travel will always have a special place in my heart, but it comes with major challenges for the disabled community. Personally, I want to provide a platform, whether it be via TV, Web or brick and mortar business, where the disABLED community can come to up to date travel information. I want travel packages that are truly custom to the communities needs (whether it’s group travel or solo travel). Most importantly I want to partner with corporate America and the medical practitioners to address both the travel and medical needs in every tourist destination. I want it to be affordable but epic at the same time.
I personally I want to travel for both personal and business and there are destinations that are on my bucket list such as the motherland, Africa! I list South Africa on my board but I wasn’t to travel across the entire continent. Also, Paris, France is a must-do but that is already in the works :-) Stay tuned because I’m not slowing down! I want to break the barriers of travel and show millions that we can and we will.
I have the number “45” on my board and it simply serves as a reminder of the age of when I would like the majority if not all of this done or in full motion.
I have my favorite scripture, “Walk by Faith, Not by Sight.” It serves as a reminder that I must have faith in God and his plan for me and my life. None of this runs without Him or without my unwavering faith that He got it and me!
I included a hashtag and the word “stream queen.” Both of these represents my brand and it’s social movement of #CanCanOnWheelz. This is where it all starts…Socials! I want that hashtag to be a part of the social media conversations, the disABLED community conversations and I want it to recreate revenue for new and innovative business ventures.
My ultimate goal is creating a non-profit! As a disABLED adult one of the things I noticed was there was no space that celebrated living and thriving as a disABLED adult. I want to create a creative, fun and engaging space that showcases both the disabled and non-disabled community that being disABLED doesn’t mean you can’t be educated, live independently, date, embrace your sexuality. We are still human and crave the same things that everyone else does. I want to create multiple levels of support that uplifts and teaches those within the disABLED community about ways of modified “adulting” and equips them on what is needed to live and thrive. I want my non-profit to be a space for learning, growing, networking and happiness… because life is hard enough!
As you can see, my goals are big and definitely require work and passion, but as the saying goes, if your goals don’t scare and challenge you… are they really goals?
Contentment lies in the bed of comfortability. Don’t ever get comfortable; live life in the spirit of challenging yourself both mentally and physically. I challenge you to challenge yourself and make a vision board or a list of goals that challenge who you are and what you believe you are capable; because at the end of the day… you are your only competition.
Until Next Time… this is my world… on wheelz