Life Collaging — Visualizing Your Future

Every six months I’ve gotten in the habit of creating what I call a Life Collage. Now that I’ve passed this habit onto many of my friends who have seen their lives change for the better because of it, I figure it best to share this habit more widely to those who I befriend, those who I mentor, and to those whom I have yet to meet but who wish to feel a sense of direction in their lives.

Why Life Collaging?

Feel free to skip this portion if you would just like to get right into the activity below.

This concept started many years ago when a friend of mine took me through a “life mapping” exercise. The exercise required a participant to take one full hour to write sticky notes of every single thing they have ever wanted to accomplish in their lives (from starting a company, to having children, to going to law school, and beyond). From there, one could organize these desires on a 5 to 50 year timeline (or they could organize them by category, if helpful). I loved this concept, but as a visual thinker, it was hard for me to take much from the activity after finishing.

A few years later a mentor of mine was giving me advice about how to choose my next job. He suggested I write down the general “vibe” of what I was looking for in a new position — things like, “Open office” “In New York” “Can wear whatever I want”. I personally struggled to create this list (though I tried many times to), but found that it was easier for me to visualize these characteristics. It was much easier for me to use imagery to denote what I definitely wanted and definitely did not want. This got me thinking about the power of collaging or creating a “mood board”.

Many of my friends in the art world use mood boards for almost every project they take on. A mood board is a physical or digital collage that arranges images, materials, text, and other design elements into a format that’s representative of the final design’s style. Filmmakers, for example, typically use mood boards in order to outline every aspect of the visuals they hope to capture for their visual product- their collages usually feature the lighting, location, wardrobe and overall tone and aesthetic of the film. Collaging allows you to have something to reference when you feel stuck, and it often allows you to have a mental model for a very abstract idea that is too difficult to put into words.

Thus was born the Life Collaging activity! I combined all of the useful advice I’ve received into a short, thought-provoking pursuit. This one hour goal-setting creative exercise will help you both articulate and visualize the next 6 months of your life in a fun and non-threatening way. It is the perfect Sunday activity when you are feeling stuck or uncertain of what your future will hold.

How do I create a Life Collage?

I’ve created this template that you may copy and make your own. Within this template you will find instructions, 4 blue slides, 4 white slides, and 4 categories:

Career, Relationships, Home, and Lifestyle.

The blue slides are where you will write your goals for the next 6 months. Writing your goals will allow you to create concrete action items that you can check in on at the 3 and 6 month mark.

The white slides are for creating a collage or “mood board” that will allow you to better visualize the life you want and help make life related decisions easier (from where you work to what you wear and so on).

Note that these categories are not set in stone. If you prefer to do this activity using different categories in your life, such as finances, health, education or others, please feel free! This deck was created to give structure, but once you make a copy of this template, it is your creative space to make your own.

As seen within the template, the agenda for the activity is as follows:

Step 1: 20 minutes (minimum)

On blue slides, write all of the things you wish to accomplish in the next 6 months in the tone of you already having accomplished it. For example, “I have saved 5K” or “I wake up at 6am everyday”. Write at least 10 goals per slide.

Step 2: 35 minutes (minimum)

On white slides, use Google or Pinterest to find images that best capture the future that you want for yourself. Organize them into a collage (or whatever speaks to you creatively). Bonus: Add meaningful quotes or text of how you feel after achieving these things (such as “I am accomplished”, “I am empowered”). Add at least 5 images per slide.

Step 3: Set a calendar reminder to check back in at 3 months and at 6 months

Hopefully your life has moved in a direction that resembles the goals outlined in this deck in 3 months. If it hasn’t, reflect on why not. If it has, reward yourself. After reflecting at the 6 month mark, restart this process and create a new life collage for the next 6 months. Repeat indefinitely.

Does Life Collaging work?

There are so many ways to evaluate and create process around one’s life. I offer this method only as a suggestion to those who are visual learners who may feel stuck or want to feel a sense of control over their future. I have seen friends complete this activity and immediately exist in the world with increased confidence and certainty of where their life is headed and who they want to be.

I hope this short activity is helpful to whomever stumbles upon this post. Remember to have fun with it! Good luck!