It’s been quite a while since I’ve checked in here. 2017 proved to be quite a challenge and the year quickly got away from me.  While I managed to get a few projects up and running, I didn’t accomplish nearly as much as I had planned to under my author brand.  Knowing I didn’t want another slow year like 2017, I proceeded to list out my goals for the year, like I do every year.  But this year, I knew I needed to do something different to ensure I attacked my goals with fire, passion, and determination.

Then, out the blue, I received an invite to the 2018 Vision Party hosted by speaker, coach, & vision strategist Clarisa Joi. Talk about receiving confirmation on your decided direction!  At the recommendation of someone, Clarissa reach out and asked me to attend her 2018 Vision Party and cover it as a blogger.  I immediately said yes, not only would this event help me get better motivated about my goals, but it would also allow to get a jump my goal of covering more events in 2018 in an official capacity.

I’ve attended vision board parties in the past, but I must say, I was very impressed with Clarissa’s program.  Not only did we produce vision boards, but she had 4 awesome speakers lined up to pour into us to get us, everyone lift the event motivated and fired up about their upcoming 2018 successes.

I won’t give away too much inspiration shared because this was not a free event, but will share a few kernels of knowledge I gleaned from each speaker:

• Oginga Carr, one of the nation’s top coaches, challenged us to change the way we think by giving us 4 tips to win our day.
• Lisa Moore of Dancing Water and Girls Inc of Memphis, challenged us to always be authentic to ourselves in everything that we do and pursue.  Also, our goals must be specific, as well as, the plans to achieve them.
• Alexandria Matlock, CEO of ContingoCreative, told us to STOP the bad and negative energy from blossoming, there is power in positive thinking and clear energy,
• Felix Anderson, CEO of The Executive Concierges, charged us to wake our successful selves up!

After receiving such awesome words of inspiration, Clarissa led us in a vision casting exercise designed to help us get color, clarity, and deeper detail surrounding our 2018 goals.  Even though I came prepared with my goals written down for each of my 3 main focuses for the year, I found this exercise enlightening and it definitely helped me prepare my vision board in a concise, multi-leveled fashion.

By “concise” I mean it only took me about 20 minutes to locate all of the images and words I felt I needed for my board.  In the past, I’ve spent the greater part of an hour or 2 combing through magazines looking for inspiration.  My energy and focus was not properly channeled so I cut out way more pictures than I needed, as well as having duplication. By “multi-leveled” I mean each and every thing I placed on my board has once than a singular meaning or inspiration for me.  And I am fully confident that as I look at my board daily for the rest of the year, I will continue to discover more meanings for the items I chose to highlight.

If you get the chance, I highly recommend you attend one of Clarissa’s events and be on the lookout for her 2019 Vision Party.  I can’t wait to see what she has in store for us next year.  I also can’t wait to share my 2018 progress.

Have any of you ever attended a vision board party? If so, I’d love to hear about your experiences in the comment section.