Exercise 4 - Defining Your Vision And Goals

"Remember that you only have one soul; that you only have one death to die; that you only have one life, which is short and has to be lived by you alone; and there is only one glory which is eternal. If you do this, there will be many things about which you care nothing.”
St. Theresa of Avila, Maxims for her nuns

Your first task is to create a picture in your mind of what you want to create (plant the seeds of possibility).

To do this – take yourself off somewhere quiet. Still your mind and then project yourself forwards to the time you have set for your Vision. Imagine you are sitting comfortably in a favourite spot reflecting backwards on the time that has passed since you did this Vision Quest.

See if you can write a statement about what has happened and how you FEEL about it.

When you have finished writing the statement read it back to yourself and see if it is 10/10 – if not re-write it and keep re-writing it until it is 10/10.

Now see if you can anchor some of the statements and feelings to past events that were similar in nature. For example – if you are writing ‘I am fit, energetic and feel great about myself’ then think back to a time in your life when this was the case – connect the two times together.

If you can’t connect to an experience you have had then consider someone else who is how you want to be. Take a moment to imagine what it is like to be them. FEEL what it is like to be them. Anchor your Vision to this feeling.

The language of creation is the language of FEELING.

Write your Vision Statement into your Personal Development Plan.

Note that in doing this exercise different things are going to work for different people. So, you may wish to get a large sheet of paper and your coloured pencils out and draw the Vision. You might want to cut things out of magazines and stick them to a sheet of paper. Whatever works for you is ok.
You may wish to stick this up on a wall somewhere you will see it.

Next take this Vision Statement and break it down into the 5 elements – Physical, Mental, Emotional, Spiritual, Material. Use the format in the Personal Development Plan

Under each heading write a ‘Being’ statement and a ‘Doing’ list for each element - that is for physical the ‘being’ part might be 'To live a life with boundless/limitless energy'. Then the ‘doing’ list could be – ‘I exercise 3 times per week, I do yoga and stretching every day, I eat healthy organic food’.

When you have completed this part of the exercise you may feel like it’s all a bit overwhelming so the next step is to take a step back and consider what are the 80/20 projects? That is the key issues that when addressed will get you 80% of the way there but take only 20% of the effort. It’s an energy management question.

When you have determined what these issues are fill them in on the Personal Development Plan.