Attract Travel Using Images For Your Vision Board

by Cricket Wingfield, MD

"To travel is to live."

~Hans Christian Andersen

Whatever your travel goals may be, a travel vision board can help you plan and dream. Many people have questions about creating a travel vision board, so we’re answering a few of the most common ones here, and sprinkling in a few of our favorite travel quotes.

A travel vision board or travel dream board is a wonderful tool to plan your next and future trips. It's a visual goal setting tool. Maybe you have places to visit on your bucket list, or want to dream up some new ideas about places to go. Creating a vision board can help you get clear about where you want to go and how you want to feel when you get there! Choosing images and words for your vision board with the places you want to go will help make those dreams a reality.

To help create a travel vision, find yourself some travel magazines or brochures. If you don’t have any around, ask friends or inquire on your online neighborhood site like Nextdoor. Often people have a stack of magazines they’re ready to purge, and love the feeling of passing them on for a good use.

Once you have magazines at hand, thumb through them and find photos of places you know you want to go and places that appeal, maybe for the first time. Don’t judge, just indulge in the fun of places you’d like to see. You can also search for specific images online and print them out. Look for images that give you the feeling you want to have as well as the location, and make sure to have a picture of yourself, too!

Even if you think a place you want to visit, or an experience you want to have is far outside of your current budget, if it appeals, cut it out and add it to your collection. Don’t edit what you’re wanting. Dreaming and seeing is always the first step in making a vision come to life. You don’t have to know how it will happen, just let your desires run wild at this stage.

While you’re looking for images, keep your eyes out and grab any words to capture the place and the feelings you’re after. Words are powerful, and the left brain just loves them. When you combine the power of the left brain that loves words and strategies with the right brain which loves images, color, and feelings, you’ve got the power of your whole brain working for you to make that adventure a reality. Remember, everything that we have was once a dream first.

Start with a physical board of some kind. I use my Living Vision Board, but a piece of posterboard or cardboard will do until you get your own. Gather up all those images and words you’ve collected to represent the wonderful sights, sounds, tastes, and feelings you want to experience. Next, find scissors and a glue stick, and you’re ready to go! 
 
Before you start to glue things down, play around with the photos and words you have and develop a pleasing arrangement. Once you like the composition, start gluing down the pieces. Be sure to add the photo of yourself in the scene! Adding your own photo gives a strong message to both your conscious and subconscious mind that you are going to be there!

I love my Living Vision Board because it goes everywhere with me and I can return to the pages holding my dreams every day I choose. I like to look at the pages with my most important goals at least once a week, to keep them top of mind.

There are several apps available to make a digital vision board, including Canva. I may be old school, but I like the tactile nature of creating a physical vision board, and keeping it where I’ll see it rather than tucked away in a digital file.
 
Most of all, have fun making your travel vision board! The world is a big place and it’s waiting for you to have all the adventures you can dream of!