True Words

Face your deficiencies and acknowledge them, but do not let them master you. 

- Helen Keller

The Philosopher’s Guide Now on Facebook and Twitter!

The Philosopher's Guide to the universe is now on Facebook and Twitter. Like our Facebook page and follow us on Twitter @philoguide to keep up on the blog's latest news.

Creating Your Vision For Your Ideal Life

After you've set some goals for yourself, the next step is to create your vision for how your life is going to be. Creating your vision is a crucial part of the creative process, and shouldn't be skipped. Goal-setting isn't always enough. The goals you've chosen paint a picture of your new life – now it's your job to depict what that picture looks like, in a way that you can look at it every day.

There's quite a few ways to do this, and guess what? It doesn't have to feel like work. There are tons of fun and creative ways to create your vision, and you get to choose the one that works best for you.

Creative Visualization Tools:

1. The Vision Board
2. Mind Movies
3. LifeBook
4. Journaling

The Vision Board, a term coined by visionary John Assaraf, is a great tool to use for any age. It's fun, creative, and gets you thinking about what your goals look like. A Vision Board can be on anything – a bulletin board, poster board, or you can even glue or tape pieces of construction paper together to make your own. It doesn't matter, as long as you're happy with the end result and had fun doing it.

Next you'll want to take a look at that list of goals and find images that correspond to them. Surf the internet and print pictures to cut out and post on your vision board, cut pictures out of magazines, or draw. You can put scraps of colored paper or Post-It notes behind your pictures to spice it up, use glitter or virtually anything else you can think of. Once you've finished, put your Vision Board in a place where you'll see it every day. Look at it and think about what it feels like to have those things that you've put on your Vision Board, and really feel it. It's the emotion attached to your vision that's really going to bring it to you.

Mind Movies! This is one of my favorite tools. It really works. Mind Movies was created by Ryan Higgins and Natalie Ledwell, and enables people all over the world to reach their goals through motivational, customizable movies. They have the software to make these movies online, and let me tell you – you don't have to be a video editor or any sort of computer wiz in order to make this work for you. They make it easy on the user.

Mind Movies consist of photos that you either choose from their database or upload from your own computer, backed with music of your choosing and any number of present tense, positive affirmations. There's a wide variety of ones to choose from, but an example of these affirmations is “I am completely content” or “I have more than enough money.” Just watch your Mind Movie a few times a day and watch as your dreams come true.

If you don't want to pay the membership price, we suggest you try your hand at making your own. There's simple, user friendly video editing software that comes with most computers. If you're using Windows, you should have Windows Movie Maker already installed. If you're a Mac user, iMovie is a simple program to use and you should have your very own visualization movie in no time. We do suggest signing up for the mailing list at Mind Movies, as they provide you with 6 free, already made Mind Movies for your personal use. They also send a number of cool and inspiring videos, and sometimes they even have online seminars which are extremely beneficial.

Lifebook is a personal development tool created by Jon Butcher, and is a book that depicts the way you want your life to be, in all aspects of your life. This is particularly powerful for some people because it is based on their individual values, beliefs, goals, needs, and desires and encompasses twelve categories of life, so it is a very straightforward tool which allows for a clearer vision of your ideal life. These categories include your vision for your health and fitness, intellectual life, emotional life, character (characteristics/traits you want to have), spiritual life, love relationship, parenting, social life, financial life, career, quality of life, and your life vision (what it's all supposed to look like).

Jon has a program you can follow, or you can make your own, much in the same way you would make a Vision Board. Just get yourself a journal, notebook or scrap-booking book and you'll be set and ready to make your own Lifebook. Use pictures, words, and anything else you might think of to make this picture of your life-to-be.

The last tool we're going to talk about is journaling. This is definitely an option most enjoyed by the writers of our world. Basically you write the story of your life, much like you would write a fictional story, but here's the best part – it's your story for your dream that's going to come true! The key is to write everything in the present tense, and be as positive with your wording as you can. Write it how you want your life to be. Read that story every day and feel the feelings of having the life of your dreams.

Happy creating!

Check out these websites and what they have to offer:

Vision Board – www.johnassaraf.com/events-attractions/the-complete-vision-board-kit-is-here

Mind Movies – www.mindmovies.com
Lifebook – www.mylifebook.com

Exercise: Discovering Your Core Values

1. Setting

Before you start this exercise, go to a nice, quiet room free of clutter (mostly). Preferably a place where you feel secure and have privacy. Light some candles or incense, open the window, or nothing at all – whatever makes you the most comfortable.

2. Have Your Tools at the Ready

Keep a piece of paper and a writing utensil nearby so you can jot down your values as they come to you. It is not recommended to use a computer, as you really shouldn't give yourself the opportunity to get distracted. This is your life-work, after all. Make sure you write on something you won't throw away. This list will prove to be a guiding light in moments of darkness.

3. Ask Yourself the Big Question

“What is truly important to me?” Think about what traits and values are most important to you. You could come up with anything from freedom or security, honesty, integrity – there is no wrong answer. Don't be discouraged if nothing comes immediately. You may not have ever asked yourself this question, or not given it much thought. Just keep thinking about it.

4. Write Down What Comes to Mind

Write down everything that comes to mind. Don't analyze, don't self-censor. Be completely honest with yourself. This list is just for you, so write down the words that most appeal to you, and don't concern yourself with what you think “should” be on the list. Don't worry about the order either – just try to get all the words that come to mind out of your head and onto the paper.

5. Widdle Down the List

Go through your list and rate the values based on the 1 to 10 system, 10 being the highest. This will determine the ones you feel the strongest about. Try to get the list down to five, but it's okay if you have more. There are no rules saying you can only have five values.

6. Prioritize

Prioritize your list in order from most important to least important. Mostly, your core values will compliment each other, but there may be times when they conflict. Just look at the conflicting values and determine which one is more important to you.


If you’re having trouble getting started, consult the list below to get some ideas. This list contains only a marginal amount of the hundreds of possible values out there. Good luck!

Accomplishment
Accountability
Accuracy
Adventure
Appreciation
Balance
Beauty
Calmness
Challenge
Change

Charity

Clarity

Cleanliness
Collaboration
Commitment
Communication
Community
Competence
Competition
Connection
Cooperation
Creativity
Decisiveness

Determination

Discipline
Discovery
Diversity
Dynamism
Efficiency

Enjoyment

Equality
Excellence
Fairness
Faith
Faithfulness
Family
Freedom
Friendship
Fun

Generosity

Gentleness

Goodwill
Goodness
Gratitude
Hard work

Happiness

Harmony

Health

Honor
Improvement
Independence
Individuality
Inner peace
Innovation
Integrity

Intelligence

Intensity
Justice

Kindness

Knowledge
Leadership
Love
Loyalty
Peacefulness
Privacy
Progress
Prosperity
Punctuality
Reliability
Resourcefulness
Respect for others
Responsibility
Safety
Security
Self-actualization
Self-reliance
Self-thinking

Sensitivity

Service
Simplicity
Skill
Solving Problems
Spirit
Spirituality
Stability
Status
Strength
Success
Teamwork
Tolerance
Tradition
Tranquility
Trust
Truth
Unity
Variety

Well-being

Wisdom

How to Set Powerfully Motivating and Life-Changing Goals

The importance of goal-setting as it pertains to personal growth must not be underestimated. It is quite possibly your most valuable tool in your quest for creating your ideal life. Goals not only spark the necessary motivation for change, they provide a positive vision for the future, giving you a sense of direction and purpose. The hitch is, proper goal-setting isn't necessarily something they taught in school. Most people haven't got the faintest clue on where to start, and therefore the goal-setting gets put off for another day, perhaps indefinitely.

So how does one set a powerfully motivating and life-changing goal?

Characteristics of Strong Goals:

1. Focus-Driven
2. Passion Evoking
3. Relevant
4. Measurable
5. Attainable (Believable)

When setting a personal goal, it is important to make sure the goal is specific and has a clear focus. If your goal is to make more money, simply stating, “I want to make more money,” may not have quite as much effect as, “I want to increase my monthly income by $1,000.” Wording is key.

Your goal should be something that gets you excited when you think about it. You need to be on fire for what it is that you're wanting. If when you think about your goal, you start to feel down on yourself or you lack emotion for the goal, then it's time to go back to the drawing board and either rethink whether the goal is really in line with your higher purpose, or rewrite the goal to inspire more emotion within you.

The goal needs to be relevant to what you want to achieve as a part of your lifetime wants. If you don't know what your lifetime wants are – better get cracking. A good way to find out what your lifetime goals are is to figure out what your core values are. Your values are what drive you to do the things you do, and once you've got a list of your values, your lifetime goals will become clear.

A measurable goal is one that, when you achieve it, will be noticeable to you. A measurable goal for a person who makes only $8,000 a year might be to make $20,000 in a year. A measurable goal for a small business owner with only one shop might be to expand the business to another location, and so on and so forth. The important thing is that you set your goal to be at least slightly out of your comfort zone, so that you have this bright and shiny beacon to strive for.

Your goal should be attainable. That is to say, it should be believable and seem possible to you. If you're that person making $8,000 in a year, and you've set a goal to make $60,000 in a year, but feel doubtful or insecure about how achievable the goal is for you, then perhaps a smaller goal should be set to instill the confidence you need to get on track. It's all about getting the ball rolling. The initial friction is the most difficult to overcome.