Maybe you’ve heard of them. Sometimes also called visual boards. I like the idea of calling them intentions. It fit right in line with my dry erase board I have in my writing cottage where I write out what I call my “heart intentions” which I’ve been doing for the past five years.

I remember years ago when I was in a marketing company selling products and how we were encouraged to do these boards. I never did one because it seemed to focus on material things.  Not that I didn’t want to go on vacation, or perhaps new clothes, or a new car. But looking back I was lost then, not really knowing what it was that made me happy.

I took a class yesterday called “Setting Your Intentions for 2014” where we created intention boards. It was fun!  The gal that taught the class, Elise, had us first do different types of exercises and answering thought provoking questions by writing them down.

She also shared power words with us. As she read them we had to write down those that resonated with us. Some that jumped at me were: Be, Courage, Intuition, Joy, Smile, Simplicity, Peace, and Spirituality.

Then we grabbed a board,magazines, scissors and glue stick, and began laying out our year of intentions.  Here is a tour around mine:

Top left hand corner is a small green house to remind me to keep living simply and with less “stuff.” Having a small house helps with that, I think; Right hand side I love the words Joyful Secondact- having turning 50 this past summer I plan to live the second half of my life that fits me best;  I also found the word fear and made a big red circle with a line through it- as a reminder to not let fear stand in my way.

The large word “yoga” jumped out at me as I love, love, love my yoga practice. Then I saw the words “live your yoga.” That reminds me to live my truth of the unique person that I am.

Bottom left you see a black pencil sketch of a girl holding a heart shaped balloon, reminding me to keep following my heart. Bottom right hand side is Oprah being loved up by all her pups… ok, so I don’t need a reminder to be with and love my dogs, as I’d do that 24-hours a day if I could!  But the picture depicts pure joy to me and that is how I feel when I am with my dogs.

The rest are words of reminders of and how I want to live each day–“giving smiles” which I want to do more, “awareness” of living in the moment, “Calm within” as a reminder on those days I forget and “grace” reminding me that when I am in a state of grace it means I am living from my soul.

I didn’t find the words Share, Inspire and Encourage in the magazines I was perusing, so I made my own. They are important to me. After I came out of my sabbatical last October that was my message from my heart… that I wanted to keep writing, and through my writing I want to share, inspire and encourage others.

Though I used to balk at the idea of doing one of these, I drove home feeling calm, focused, and happy. My board will now sit in my writing cottage as my daily reminder.

I hope by sharing mine it will inspire you to make your own and watch the year unfold with a visual reminder of what is important to you.