Your Personal Vision Statement: The Beginning of Your Future

By Beth Armknecht Miller, President and Executive Coach, Executive Velocity Inc

When coaching executives and business leaders, I often discover that although their company has a vision statement, they don’t have their own personal vision statement.  So what’s the big problem of not having your own personal vision statement?  What I have found time and again, especially with older leaders, was that those who did not have their own personal vision for the future, found themselves at a point in their career completely dissatisfied with their life. Those who were clear about their personal vision for their future felt a lot more complete as a person and were a lot more successful.

So if you would like to be happier and more successful, take some quiet time to create your own personal vision statement.  It will help you define where you want to take your life, making it a more purposeful life.  And it will help you to design your own future.

How to Create a Personal Vision Statement

You will need to find a quiet place so that you can reflect on yourself and what is important to you.  Ask yourself the following questions about your future:

• Where will you be living and/or working?
• Who will you be with - family, friends, associates?
• What will you be doing - working, playing, traveling, volunteering, etc?
• What will you have accomplished both personally and professionally?
• What will be important to you? Include your values, feelings etc.

Once you have answered these questions think about if your vision for the future is achieved, how would you feel?  Feelings are very important in this process, because feelings, if strong enough, will drive us to take action.  They will motivate and energize us to take the necessary steps needed to get to our vision.

Finally, start crafting your vision for the future and, more importantly, write it down on paper.  Make it concise, write in the present tense, and record it on something you can take with you and reference on a daily basis.

And remember that your vision for your future can change.  It isn’t set in concrete.  It is a compass to help you have a life that is complete and joyous.  When you get to the end of your life, having followed your own vision, you will have no regrets.