The Vision Board Reward

The sweat dripped off my face and onto my thighs. I couldn't see my hand in front of my face because the steam in the room was so thick. I wiped my face, a slow sweep of my index fingers from the corner of my eyes to the top of my temples. I was so hot. But I had to practice. Practice makes perfect. I closed my eyes. It was the feeling, my teacher had told me, that was the glue for manifesting any desire. And I wanted this feeling every day, for the rest of my life. I wanted to feel HOT. The past thirty years had been cold. I know you think I mean that metaphorically, but no, I mean, literally, freezing cold. I'd been born and raised in a northern state ("nice place to visit but you wouldn't want to live there") and that meant that there were two seasons: winter and construction. When I waited for the city bus in the morning in the dark so I could spend an hour and 20 minutes each way on public transportation to get to work, my feet ached to the bone with a hardness that I prayed hadn't already crept up my legs, into my stomach, and infected my heart. I knew it hadn't -- yet. I was vigilant. Hypervigilant. I visited this steam room every single day after work, five nights a week. I pounded that Stairmaster as if every grungy revolving step were leading me to nirvana. I would never give up. Then I would shower and dry off, and then, only then, once I had earned my reward, envelop myself in the healing comfort of the steam room at my local fitness club. It was my personal six by six foot telephone booth whose line connected straight to the Universe herself. "This is where the magic happens," claimed my teacher. "You visualize your desire as if the dream has already come true. Close your eyes and let every sense tell you that you are already where you want to be."

In my meditation, all five senses were activated as profoundly as if I had been teleported there. The scent of cherry blossoms. The sound of the gently rolling water of the Reflecting Pool. Families of tourists arguing about where to go for lunch. High school seniors on their inaugural trip to the nation's capitol laughing and teasing each other and milling around without a sole responsibility in the world. What would I taste, though? A rich dark cherry blossom ale, brewed locally of course. And I would feel the blades of grass on the ground glide through my fingers as I felt an overwhelming gratitude for my sight, my hearing, my senses of taste and touch, my ability to walk, to breathe, to take in the scent of a flower so delicate and ineffable, that Nature herself put a limit on the amount of time humanity could enjoy the beauty of a pathway detectable purely by that flower's pink petals.

Washington, DC. That's where I wanted to be and that's where I wanted to move to, in my goal to escape the Midwest. My teacher said it was entirely possible. I'd been there before as a teenager, I'd surely get the opportunity to go again. I wasn't so sure, but I had nothing to lose by trying her techniques. And why was the element of heat so important? Ah yes, the magic ingredient, she had explained. Years ago. But it still feels like yesterday.

How We Met

One day, four years ago, an alert popped up on my phone for a new Groupon offer. "Wine and Vision Boards," it said. "40% off!" Well, now, that was a deal. "Practically the inverse of a buy!" as I used to say when I worked in retail. The description further explained that creating a mural or collage of images that encompass everything we aspire to be and have is a powerful manifesting tool when it comes to making your dreams a reality. So I bought my ticket and took the train to a very empty warehouse on a very shady side of town and thought, ok, at least there's free wine. About forty of us seekers and manifestors had made the journey. When the workshop leader appeared and smiled at everyone in the room, a sense of awe and reverence took hold of our group. She looked like a Celtic angel, her strands of fiery red hair cascading around her being: a second, tangible, aura, superimposed upon her etheric one. She had a helper who was handing out the glasses of wine (a very hot man; her soulmate perhaps?).

"Wow, Louise, your board is so interesting," Mr. Very Attractive 4 O'Clock Shadow Soulmate remarked as he came by to top off my glass of rose. "So many images of fire and water," he said after I had rubber cemented magazine clippings of fireplaces and lakeside cabins and beachfront resorts and roasted marshmallows over campfires. He peered closer and then called to his beloved with a cock of his head. Our teacher smiled back at him. I saw them lock eyes and I knew they were telepathically communicating in that way that soulmates are rumored to do.

She waltzed over and pointed to my pair of scissors. She said: "There were 2 pair of dull scissors in the basket. There are 40 people in attendance tonight. Your chances of getting the pair of dull scissors is 1 in 20 or 5%. Did you get the dull scissors?" I looked down, for some unidentifiable reason, embarrassed. "Yes, I did. I have been having trouble all night cutting out my images from all the catalogs and magazines you provided at the start of the evening to use in our vision boards."

"Don't be ashamed, Louise. It means you have won the door prize, an additional 8 hours of vision board sessions with me, so we can identify what is blocking you from manifesting all that you desire."

The next 2 months were sprinkled with hour long coaching sessions, and I am sorry to say, some of them were embarrassingly rudimentary for me as one of the uninitiated. Yes, there was Reiki healing night and tarot card night, but there was also financial planning night where I attended seminars such as "how does a credit report affect me and my future?" and "multiple streams of income" and "easy side hustles" and even "how to balance a checkbook." The book "I will Teach You to Be Rich" was literally blowing my mind. Saving up two months worth of expenses was not remotely in my purview and yet I found myself doing it, paycheck after paycheck, because of this incredibly inspiring woman who repeatedly told me that I was the Captain on the ship of my life: yes, there would be tumultuous seas I could not control. But my reaction? Absolutely under my control. And preparing for shortage was step one of manifesting. Apparently, a decent savings account balance was part of this thing she called "preparing for shortage." Week seven consisted of a palm reader who told me my Fate line ensured that I would always land on my feet, but that I had to leap first. Then came week eight.

Week Eight

Week eight arrived and I was ready for anything. Maybe it would be "Soulmates 101: fix your online dating profile in 5 easy steps" or "Numerology and your Mortgage: making sure your date of closing is compatible with your natal chart." But it was neither of these. It was creating a linkedin profile. A linkedin profile for me. My teacher asked me if I was ready to accept a job interview -- not a job offer -- tomorrow. I said, yes, that I was sure my current boss who knew I wanted to move if possible would let me use my vacation time to travel. My teacher asked me, what about twice? What about for two interviews? What about having to stay in temporary housing for a month or even two months until I could find a permanent residence? How much might that cost? We got out the calculator and agreed that while it would basically eliminate any savings I had, yes, I had finally saved enough money to fly to DC and back three times, stay in a hotel three times, and eventually move completely.

She looked at Soulmate McHotstuff O'Stubbleahan. He looked back at her pointedly. He said, "It's time." She nodded in agreement.

"We have a gift for you," she announced as she reached into her bag, a macrame hemp bag the size of a world map, and retrieved a sparkling slim box, wrapped in glittery gold wrapping paper. (Was it my birthday? No, it wasn't!)

"Thank you? I mean, thank you!" I said as I rephrased the question into an exclamatory statement.

"Open it."

I lifted the lid off the box and there was a pair of shears. Real shears. Scissors, but so much more. These were scissors that would cut fabric or lanyard or cardboard or thread.

"They'll cut etheric cord, as well," my teacher said with a smile. "These are scissors, but they are also the way to cut out your ideal future. To excise your reward. Your vision board reward. Every month, I want you to create a new vision board. Use this pair of scissors to cut out the images of your dream because each time you visualize this future, it will become stronger and more magnetic to you, pulling you, drawing you, closer to your destiny."

The two of them sat me down at the large table and placed a blank vision board in front of me, a standard 12 by 16 inch piece of blank cardboard, along with their usual endless supply of magazines and catalogs at the top right corner of the table. I placed my gift, the pair of manifesting scissors, in front of me.

"Close your eyes," said my teacher. I instantly closed my eyes, took a deep relaxing breath, and felt my mind clear. I heard her say, as if from above, "What is the thing that is most vivid in your memory when you think of being in Washington, DC, all those years ago?" her curious yet kind voice asked of me.

"I remember my makeup melting."

"Melting?"

"I mean, literally, melting. It was so hot that summer after my senior year of high school that a droplet of my MAC studio fix foundation slid down my cheek and dropped into the napkin in my lap. One of the mean girls made a comment but I blew it off."

"Ok, so you were hot. Sweating."

"Yes. And I never broke a sweat here. In fact, people would tease me in gym class, 'don't you ever sweat, Lou?' And I would say, no, I'm cold, all the time. And I never forgot how great it felt to actually feel too warm."

She chuckled. Then she asked pointedly, "What about your new living space? What does that look like?" I immediately replied, "It's in an apartment building with a pool on the roof."

She paused. "Why a pool? Why on the roof?" she finally inquired.

"Because when I was a little girl, my aunt used to take me to swimming lessons at the Y, and in the summer, we were allowed to swim in the pool on the roof. It was only open during the summer, and only YMCA members and people who lived in that apartment building could swim there. I have the most fun memories of my life, swimming there with my cousins and feeling warm and happy."

"The key is warmth. For you, the key that will unlock your desires is heat. It's the glue that will stick you to your future. Do you understand?"

"I'm sorry, no."

"Ok. Heat is the key. Every time you go into a heated, hot, warm place, you are inserting the key into the lock that is keeping you from your destiny, your best future. You need to go there, visualize being where you want to be as if you are already there, and then BAM -- you will be there. Well, in about 3 to 6 months."

I recalled immediately a groupon that I could take advantage of. Six months for the price of three at a local health club that had a sauna and a steam room. I could go there and close my eyes, and inhale my destiny in the middle of a cubicle of humidity. That was my part-time job now.

Afterward

It's been five years since my first Wine and Vision Boards workshop. I now teach wine and vision board classes in Alexandria and DuPont Circle. I live in a gorgeous building in Navy Yard, a hip neighborhood in DC, with a pool on the roof. My boyfriend Mac says he knew I was the one when I asked him if he wanted to have a contest and see who could stand sitting in the jacuzzi on a 97 degree day the longest. I knew he was the one when I saw a key tattooed on his arm. My destiny is locked in. But for good measure, on our one year anniversary, I had a tiny pair of scissors tattooed on my ankle. Whenever I tie my shoes, I know that my life is what it is because I put one foot in front of the other. And, I assiduously cut out the past and expectantly cut into my future.