If there’s one thing I know to be true, it’s that when you set a clear intention and actively spend time developing an inspiring vision of what you want, positive movement starts to happen.

Of course, intentions and visioning aren’t magical. We all need to add some good old-fashioned action into the mix when we’re working towards achieving any kind of goal. It’s just that consistently taking action — as well as taking the right action — is so much harder when we haven’t done first things first.

I see a lot of people who jump into action right away, without clarity, a plan or anything else (and I’ve done that, too, but it often ends up being the hard road).

First: the reconnecting and reclaiming

This is building a foundation of self-awareness. It’s about stepping back and assessing where you are and reconnecting to your needs and your values. Through this grounding, it’s easier to set out an authentic and aligned vision of where you may want to go.

In business, successful companies act with strategy and vision. They have a sense of where they are headed before they start to head there. Yet what seems like common sense and clear direction often gets lost in translation when we look at developing direction and strategy within our own individual lives.

It doesn’t need to be a drawn out process, but it is an essential building block to changes you’ll want to keep.

Then the practices: intention, visualization and story

These are all ways we can leverage our brain and our psychology to work with us, as we design and execute our next steps.

Top performance athletes and others over time have used the practices of setting intentions and using visualization to reach seemingly impossible goals. Yet these are underutilized tools for many of us in everyday life. It doesn’t help that there is a lot of misconception about how visualization can influence our brains and, as a result, our thoughts, emotions and behaviors. (It’s not about the outcome.)

To leverage these tools most effectively, set your intentions for the direction you want to go, how you want to show up and feel along the way. This isn’t necessarily about a roadmap as much as a desire map.

Focus your visualizations on the getting there, not on the outcomes. Visualize yourself in the steps along the way. See yourself successfully doing — and enjoying — the activities you’ll do to get there. See the milestones. Visualize yourself being the person who is creating those results.

We’re actually visualizing all the time. We’re just not always intentional about it.

Your narrative is another excellent place to look. We all have stories in place around what we want to achieve. Not all of those stories are helpful. Where does your story need to change and evolve? How would you rewrite it to be more empowering?

We’re already telling those stories. We just want to make them work for us rather than against us.

Whether it’s adjusting your mindset to allow the possibility of a positive result to a negative situation or whether it’s changing your life or career direction entirely, when you are grounded in what you intend and what you envision for yourself, you will start to experience change. Small changes will be followed by larger changes. And, often along with them, intangible but powerful shifts that sneak in so stealthily that you may not even notice them right away.

Sometimes this snowball of activity starts to happen quickly, but it still needs nurturing and practice. Sometimes those small changes will feel like synchronicity. Sometimes we don't make the connections between what we’re practicing and what’s changing. Always, though, the shifts are taking place.

With a clear intention, you begin to act differently.

With a clear vision, you begin to see differently.

The impossible starts to seem possible. And then real.

When you expect change, change is more likely to occur. When you are clearly focused, what you’re focused on is more visible to you. When you open up the space for a positive outcome, positive outcomes are much more likely to unfold, even if they aren’t the ones you were expecting.

You’re curating an environment of change and tapping into a more natural flow.

As a coach, I’ve many times seen simple but consistent practices resolve stuck situations and impossible timing suddenly fall neatly into place. I've watched milestones achieved quickly once the stories around them changed and the vision became clear. I love witnessing the interplay of reconnection + evidence-based change practices + intentional action plans to move mountains.

As best I can, I am always implementing and evolving these practices more fully in my own life, too. As a result, much of what I once thought “impossible” was not just possible, it became the new normal, opening new room for what’s next. That not only continually creates new levels of “possible” but allows room for bolder, even more aligned visions to emerge, too.

It’s not always about “more.” It’s about thriving in your own vision and letting go of the ones that aren’t truly yours.

Try a coaching experiment today.

Let’s break your vision-casting and intention-building down to small, actionable steps. Spend a few minutes with these questions:

How would you like to be today? What would you like to experience as you go through your day?

Visualize yourself in those answers, taking the steps that feel aligned to your intended direction and outcomes.

If there’s a visual reminder that you can put within sight for your day, do that.

During the day, make an effort to check in with yourself. What is happening? What have you noticed? How are you being?

Watch for movement. Practice daily. I'd love to hear what you experience.