By Madison Zarnett
We all want the life of our dreams. Feeling a sense of joy and satisfaction by existing in a reality that we want to exist in is one that is up there with top feelings to have. In this article, I’m going to show you a strategy that I am using to achieve my highest levels of wellbeing. It’s evolving as I evolve. As I grow and evolve, so to do my strategies. I still have a long way to go but that’s just life, isn’t it? The goal of the manifestation binder is to clearly and explicitly tell the universe what we want to attract into our life this year in a reasonable and attainable way. It’s like saying, hey universe, let’s go at this together.
Here are some visuals of what my vision binder looked like for 2022 and what I’ll be basing this article off of. My new vision binder will embody the same essence with different visions and ideals, because now, it’s nearly 2023, and I probably achieved ~85% of what I aimed to achieve in 2022. A great year.
For my binder, I (generally) categorize the wellbeing and health in my life to be made up of 6 areas. Each makes up about 15-20% of our life, so to neglect any area of our life is to neglect an area of our well being - which is acceptable for periods of time but unsustainable in the long term. We feel impacted when we neglect any of these areas in our life for more than a season.
In general, these are the 6 areas of our life which determine our wellbeing and life satisfaction.
Mind (mental)
Body (physical)
Financial
Professional
Relationships
Soul (spiritual/
emotional)
1 Sort out your targets
So first, start thinking about each area of your life - what is it that you want? Like SMART goals, try and imagine something that is attainable. It can be long term or short term, but attainable. It doesn’t have to be something that you achieve during this year, but it can be something that you begin or continue to work towards. When developing your goals, ask yourself: what will it mean to you if you achieve this? How will it feel? You’re on your way there!
Financial goals are the clearest ones for me to think about so I’ll start there. Financial stability is a powerful feeling that is achieved through developing our relationship with money. Fiscally, what do you want? There are many questions around money that you need to ask yourself to find out and narrow in your most important fiscal desires. Do you want a new car? Do you want to start a business? Do you want to develop your business? Do you want to live debt free? Do you want to become a more knowledgable investor? Do you want to be more mindful with money? Do you want to have a strong relationship with money? Do you want to renovate your home? Do you want to buy a home? Do you want to buy an investment property? Do you want to develop a deeper understanding of financial markets? Do you want to save? What is it that you want to get out of developing your relationship with your finances? Whatever it is that you want, both long term or short term, work it out and get clear on what you want.
Next, let’s think about our Relationships; our core beliefs around acceptance, connection, and community are heavily fostered through our relationships. Our relationships deeply impact how we move and how we feel. Most people love and need others, to affirm our sense of self, because we wouldn’t survive without them, and more. Personally, I depend on so many people in my life and when I neglect fostering those relationships, I feel disconnected from my self and alienated from the world. Ask yourself the important questions to find out what you want to adopt in order to feel like you’re moving towards the highest version of yourself in terms of your relationships - with both yourself and others. What relationships do you want to foster and why? What will it mean to you if you achieve this? How will it feel?
Mentally, what do you need to have your thoughts be as healthy and positive as possible? For mental goals, maybe you’ll choose that you want clear thoughts, maybe you want to improve your memory, perhaps you want to develop a positive mindset. Maybe you want to read more books, scroll less, whatever it is. Get clear on what you want and what it will mean to you.
Next, you’re going to want to ask yourself these questions for all of the major areas in your life, professionally, spiritually/emotional (think: feelings), and physical goals (think: health). Once you’ve gotten clear on what you want from these six areas of your life in order to operate at your highest self, then you can move onto your action plan - we’re letting the universe know what we want, and we are making moves to show the universe that we are aligning.
2 Outline the habits and mindsets we need to attain
Here’s where the work comes in. The power of habits and building habits is absolutely unmatched when it comes to achieving something. Under each goal, outline what you’re going to do to achieve it and which habits, steps, and mindsets you’re going to develop to get there. Our habits and mindset determine what manifests. Through developing habits and mindsets, we remove the conscious effort required to make decisions; we simply move up there and the decisions happen as a byproduct of the alignment. It is what it is and we are moving in that direction because OBVIOUSLY we are, what other direction is there to move? We’re already there, it’s a process of materializing.
For example, let’s say your goal is to save money. How are you going to achieve that? Save x amount per month, avoid impulsive buying, be more money conscious, cook food at home, only you can decide what you can do to work towards that goal, but work and habits compound. If you get into a habit of living a lifestyle that aligns with your goal, there’s literally no reason why it shouldn’t be met. Your goals should be able to fill your entire year and some should not even be started until later on in the year. This is about developing sustainable habits that improve our quality of life - everything at once would be unsustainable. We are limited by TIME.
I’ll give you an example of a few goals and habits that I came up with last year so that you can model your habits in a similar way... also time for me to humble brag about some things that I accomplished in 2022. I surpassed some of my goals and fell short on a few of them and some transformed during the year and manifested as something parallel, but overall, it was valuable to me to brainstorm and develop my mindset and the framing required to move in the direction of my dreams.
Physical
Learn Horseback Riding
Habits:
Research where to take take lessons
Sign up for horseback riding lessons
In Q4 2022 I got myself into lessons and learned how to ride a horse. I didn’t ride horses as a child, nobody in my family rides horses, but I had a desire. So I did it. And I can ride now, properly, and the horses love me back. I saved this goal for Q4. Not written is my parallel dream of developing a love of horses, committing to a sport, because these were unconscious. I had to get the ball rolling on what I wanted to get in touch with the even deeper desires that I had.
Professional
Finish Master’s Degree
Habits:
Get an A+ in my final class.
Study consistently
Finish with a 4.27 GPA
Communicate with my peers regularly
Apply Indigenous Education concepts in my practice
… I now have a Master’s of Education in Indigenous Education and graduated with the 4.27/4.3 GPA while working full time and working on many other goals, so…
Mental
Improve Self Talk
Habits:
Be kind to myself
Be my own bestie
Treat myself the way that I treat other people
Think about myself the way that I think about other people
Remind myself that I’ve got this
I’ve gotta admit, my goals for my mental state lacked a lot of ambition last year and that’s an area of my life that I aim to give more effort to this year. However, I definitely love myself a lot more this year and for sure am better to myself, so I guess I met my manifestations and developed some positive habits.
Relationships
Strengthen Existing Relationships
Habits:
Hang out with high value friends at least 2x a month
Call grandparents every two weeks
Call/text Leigh regularly
Call mom/dad at least once every two weeks
Stay true to my boundaries
Honestly, this was a great year for my existing relationships. This was my best year for keeping in touch with my best friend Leigh, and I absolutely feel closer to everyone in my life. The relationships in my immediate circle have been strengthened. By putting the manifestation out there are doing my best to align, I was able to stay better in touch with the people that matter to me. I’m definitely keeping this manifestation and adding a few more habits, such as calling my brothers more often. I wasn’t strict on the every two weeks or whatever, but it kept me committed to communicating more frequently.
So, go through your goals and outline some habits and mindsets or things that you’re going to do to get started in moving in that direction. Your perspective is determined by your mindset and habits, so get to it.
You can brainstorm with friends and family or alone, but give it a lot of thought of what is realistic and can align within your life in a sustainable way.
3 Develop affirmations
At the bottom of every page, include some affirmations to affirm what is. They should align with that area of your life so that when you’re reviewing your binder, you're consistently affirming this to yourself and universe.
Some examples of affirmations:
I care for my body and well-being. I make healthy choices.
I am loved by those who I love.
I am protected.
My attention requires investment.
I am independently wealthy through ethical and intelligent choices. Money flows to me in abundance.
I attract high quality people.
I provide unique, high quality, high value services.
I make choices that reflect the highest good of all.
I am worthy of abundance and my highest joy.
You can develop any affirmation or multiple affirmations that resonate with you.
4 Develop your visual cues
Finally, now it’s time to develop your vision board. First, make a beautiful title page with affirmations that you want to see daily. I used Instagram tags and Pinterest to find images that aligned with all of the goals that I set. Collect and arrange them either on Microsoft Word, Pages, or Canva. My friend used Canva and hers looked really nice while I used Microsoft word.
5 Add anything extra you require to help you meet your goals
I recommend having a Q1, Q2, Q3, and End-Of-Year check in. These check ins helped me outline which areas I was neglecting and which areas were thriving. As a result, I was able to make functional next steps to move me in the direction that I wanted. I also included a book list so that I could keep track of the books that I was reading and when I read them, to stay committed to my goal.
In 2021 I read MAYBE a single book and in 2022 I read 11, so even though I didn’t reach the goal of 12, I came pretty close.
6 Print it and assemble it!
Get a binder and some plastic sleeves. Put the visual cues directly beside the goals, habits, and affirmations. Put the organization for your quarterly check ins at the end so that you can stay committed, reflective, and aligned with the direction you’re aiming.
7 Get to it!
Now that your binder is complete, you need to look at when you can. Look at you, putting all of this effort towards getting organized. Feel empowered by all of the things that you’re doing, because you’re doing great.
Best of luck! For the good of all, and harm to none, may we all be elevated to the paths of our dreams through action, commitment, and consistency.
This article was originally published in the January Issue of the Sober Girls Yoga Magazine. Click here to read the full magazine.