What is Vision?

What is vision?

Here at True Balance Karate in Downers Grove, Illinois, we have a social, emotional learning program called True Character. I’m Master H, Owner and Chief Instructor here at the studio. We have developed this program to best meet the needs of our youngest students of three or four, and our oldest student of 84.

This month we’re talking about vision. We started off the new year talking about optimism and having a positive attitude, looking at things in a positive way. Last month we talked about purpose. What was our reason? What was our intent?

Vision With Our Goals

This month we’re talking about vision. And those three really go together well. When you’re talking about your purpose, you’re giving yourself your goal. You’re giving yourself your motivation. You have to have that optimistic, positive attitude, because at some point you may become discouraged and you have to be able to move past it. But you need your vision. You need to be able to see what it is that you’re hoping to accomplish.

A lot of times we think about vision as what we can see. I work with a life coach, nutrition coach, and one of the things that she had had me do was to write down on something that was going to be easily visible every day, things that I wanted to accomplish. It was a visual reminder of meditating, drinking water, eating my vegetables and taking a walk. All of those things were stuff that I wanted to make sure that I left a few moments of time to take care of every single day.

What Goes Into Vision?

Using our vision, using our actual eyesight, can really help us accomplish our goals, especially when we write them down, and we look at them every single day.

And then, we have to imagine. We have to be able to see what it is that we wish to accomplish. Some of us are stronger in this area than others. My husband and I, we have a very balanced kind of dynamic between us. He can walk into an empty space, and he can picture the finished product. He can picture what it’s going to look like. He can see where the walls are going to go. He can sense how the energy is going to flow.

I don’t necessarily have that particular skillset. However, with some small things like drawing tape on the floor to show where the walls would be, picking out colors and doing little pieces of paint on the walls, I can take that small piece, and then in my mind’s eye, make it bigger. I can kind of computer graphic, if you will, in my mind’s eye, as long as I have a little base foundation that way.

Which helps us with our purpose. It helps us with our optimism when we are able to see what it is that we want to accomplish.

Visualizing

This month, when we’re talking about vision, we’re going to be talking about being able to see what we need to do, having our eyes open, problem solving, seeing what needs to be accomplished, and taking that action to do it. We’re going to be talking about our vision in terms of how we view it in our head, how we imagine it, how we picture it.

At that point, you’re imagining, not just what it looks like, but what it sounds like, what it tastes like, what it feels like, how you would feel. Along with how it feels like if your vision was to earn a medal, having that placed over your head. Or if your vision was to graduate with a master’s degree or a doctorate degree, or high school degree, whatever it may be, walking across the stage and feeling that handshake that occurs as they hand you that diploma, that certificate. We’re going to talk about it from that standpoint.

We’re also going to talk about what happens when we become hyper-focused, when we have that tunnel vision of this is what we are going to accomplish, and we kind of lose sight of everything else around us. We’re really going to dive into three different aspects of what vision is, and hopefully, by teaching everybody the balance of not having tunnel vision, mixed with using your eyes and using your mind, we’ll give everybody a few more tools to help them accomplish their goals, to work towards whatever it is that is motivating them.

Thanks, and I’ll see you on the mat!

True Balance Karate was founded in 2012 by Master Sue and Paul Helsdon.

We offer kids karate lessons for pre-school children ages 3-6 and elementary age kids ages 7 and up. These lessons are designed to develop the critical building blocks kids need — specialized for their age group — for school excellence and later success in life.

Our adult martial arts training is a complete adult fitness and conditioning program for adults who want to lose weight, get (and stay) in shape, or learn self-defense in a supportive environment.

Instructors can answer questions or be contacted 24 hours of the day, 7 days a week at 630-663-2000. You can also contact us here.