007: Vision as Direction | How to Stop Circling the Block and Move Forward

This episode is sponsored by Manifesting + Mimosas, a vision board workshop designed to help you slow down, gain clarity, and intentionally map your next season. In-person and virtual options are available.

Learn more at: https://connect.themindherco.com/2026-manifesting

In this episode of The MindHER Podcast, Mandi Casey reframes vision as more than goal-setting or a January tradition—and instead positions it as a powerful tool for clarity, direction, and self-leadership.

Through a personal story about literally circling the same block without realizing it, Mandi explores how easy it is to stay busy, capable, and well-intentioned while still feeling stuck. Vision, she explains, works like GPS: it doesn’t remove obstacles, but it helps you navigate them with intention and alignment.

Mandi also also dives into the tension many leaders feel between chasing future dreams and being present with the life they once envisioned. Rather than choosing one or the other, she invites listeners to see how vision and presence can coexist—and how accessing desired feeling states now naturally shapes better decisions moving forward.

If you’ve ever felt distracted instead of lost, or successful yet unsettled, this episode will help you pause, check your map, and gently steer yourself back toward where you actually want to go.

Reflection Questions:

How do I want to feel in the next year—and where can I begin experiencing that now?

If time, money, and logistics weren’t a concern, what would I want my life to include?

When I look back at the end of my life, what do I want to be able to say I was brave enough to do?

What choice will future-me wish I had made sooner?

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Transcript

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You are listening to The Mind Her podcast where mindset, leadership and personal growth come together to help you create a life and business you truly love. I'm your host, Mandy Casey, and today we're talking about vision. Listen, December isn't traditionally the visionary month of the year, most of the time we leave that for January, where you have New Year's resolutions and the whole new year, new me mentality. You know what I mean? Before you know it in the coming weeks, you're going to be inundated with advertisements, telling you all the ways in which you can improve yourself. You should get fit, you should tone up, you should declutter out with the old and in with the new. Right? All of those messages will be flooding your inboxes and your screens. But personally, I'd like to think about my vision on my own before others get in my head and tell me what to think or how to feel. Which is the very reason that I set aside intentional time at the end of the year to reflect on where I've been and where I'm going in the coming months. Vision can often be associated with hustle and pressure performance and goal chasing. And let me tell you, I am all for goal chasing. You will never hear me tell you not to chase your goals, but the key word here is that they are your goals. So I wanna talk to you today about vision as a direction, as clarity, and most importantly, vision as a way to lead yourself well, because here's what I know to be true. You can be incredibly capable, thoughtful, and doing a whole lot of what society says are the right things and still feel like you're running in circles. So let me tell you a story that illustrates exactly what I mean by this. Several years ago I was asked to teach yoga at a brand new studio in our town. It had just opened up and it was located in our downtown, which is where my office is. So I generally knew my way around and the class was scheduled for early on a Saturday morning that morning. There was a snowstorm in Oklahoma, which basically means there was a dusting of snow on the ground. But like any responsible adult, I woke up early to confirm the event was still on, which it was, and then I left with ample time to arrive, thinking that I'd take my time, I could drive slowly and still arrive early, even if the roads weren't great. As I was driving through town, I saw my friend Whitney pulling out of her neighborhood on the snowy roads as well, which was weird that we were both out early on a Saturday morning. So I called her and we were chatting about our day's plans and just catching up. And like I said, I roughly knew where I was going. I knew the downtown area and I had a general sense. Of the cross streets, but as we were talking, I couldn't find the studio. I circled the block once and then again, and then again. And honestly, it took me an embarrassing amount of time to realize that I'd circled the block three to four different times. When I saw the clock, it hit me, oh my gosh, I'd wasted time. I'd wasted energy. And when I thought I was gonna be early, now I'm gonna be late. So I told my friend, Whitney, I was like, I have got to get off the phone. I'm gonna be late. I need to figure out where I'm actually going. So I pulled into the parking lot of our local post office and I stopped the car and I put the exact address of the new studio into my GPS. And here's the interesting part. I had already passed the studio. Three different times. I wasn't that far off. I wasn't lost, I was just distracted. And the story has stuck with me for years because I think it's such a great metaphor for how life works. When we're distracted, we don't typically stop moving. We just stop moving with intention. We stay busy. We do all the things, but we burn time and energy without really getting anywhere in the process. The other thing that really stands out to me about this moment is that in order to get where I was going, I had to pause. I had to stop the car physically. I had to take a breath and honestly look at where I was in relation to where I wanted to go. That's how navigation works. You don't just need the destination, but you also need your starting point. And this matters because your starting point determines the direction that you take. And Once you know both where you're coming from and where you're headed, the path forward usually becomes pretty clear. Most of the time you're not as off course as you think. The distance between where you are and where you really wanna go can probably be achieved with a few minor tweaks. Not necessarily taking big leaps. Just like we talked about in the last episode. You probably just haven't slowed down long enough to realize that yet. My husband, he loves driving around with his navigation on the screen. Sometimes it drives me batty because I just wanna see the artist that we're listening to or scroll through a playlist, and he's always really quick to put the navigation back on the screen. And when I asked him why he always does this, at first he was like, it's because of aesthetics. He likes the look of where he's going better than paying attention to the time it takes to get there, and also because he can see where he's actually going. Even if he knows the way, like he's been there before. He can see the roads and the surroundings and it keeps him focused on moving forward. I asked a similar question to my Instagram audience. I asked them, why do you use navigation when you drive? And almost 40% of the respondents said they use it to find out where they're going. But what is so interesting to me is that more than 50% of respondents said they use it to find the fastest route. What's that line from a country song? It's like the shortest distance between two points is a straight line. Using GPS doesn't just show you where you're headed. It also shows you the fastest route, just like they said, and it shows you road closures and traffic and detours and warning signs along the way. Even potential barriers or hindrances like cops, right? Vision works in the same way. It doesn't remove the obstacles that are going to arise as you cultivate the life in business that you really love, but vision helps you to navigate those obstacles. And Patrick said something this morning that I just absolutely loved and I could not wait to share it with you. He said, everyone has a vision, but for most people, it just lives in their head. Okay. Having a vision board specifically is like projecting that GPS onto your screen. It externalizes where you're going and it allows the people around you to see the direction and offer you support. It helps you to stay on course when those distractions arise. And honestly, what I love about a vision board is that it becomes a filter for what you say yes to and what you say no to. Without that filter, it's so easy to get distracted by bright shiny objects. Then one day you find yourself looking in the mirror thinking, where am I? And how did I get here? Where were those goals I once had? So before we go any further, I wanna say something really important about vision that I actually talked to my coach about last night. Shout out to Claire because she is amazing and yes, coaches have coaches. So listen, if I'm being honest, I often struggle with the balance of chasing my dreams because Lord knows I have big dreams and being present and enjoying the fruits of my dreams that were from five years ago. I was sharing this with my coach, that it feels like I have dreams sitting in the palm of one hand and peace sitting in the palm of the other hand just begging me to be present for a moment. And relax into the actualization, the manifestation of yesterday's dreams. Do you ever feel that, like that dichotomy of do I chase dreams or do I be present with where I'm at? Listen, I'm being called to enjoy Patrick because a marriage like ours is something that I once dreamed about. I'm being called to enjoy the community we built at the collective because these women I get to do business alongside every day. They were once a figment of my imagination, like literally, but that's a whole nother story for another day. So many parts of my current life have been on my past vision boards, my children's book. I authored Precious time with my niece, freedom in my day to spend with my parents. In 2018. I had a giant treat on my vision board. That to me, symbolized putting down roots. And as I embed myself more and more in my local community, I really wanna relish that time. And as you guys know, I have these really big dreams, so how do I hold both? This was the topic of last night's coaching session, and here's what we uncovered, what I uncovered as my truth, and I wanna share it with you because I have a hunch that it might resonate with a few of you listening, vision and presence. They're not opposites. This isn't about chasing a future at the expense of today, and it's also not about abandoning ambition in the name of being present. I think we're often taught that it's one or the other, that it's black or white, but I don't believe that that's true. Let me give you an example. I tell this to my clients a lot. It's not about wanting the million dollars, right? So if you have a million dollars on your vision board, the million dollars isn't actually necessarily the thing that you desire. It's about how you believe you'll feel when you have the million dollars. Will it feel like freedom or peace or confidence or choice? The truth that I think most people miss is that those feeling states, freedom, peace, confidence, those feeling states exist right now. They're not locked into the future. They're not waiting for some achievement for you to make. And when you learn to access those feeling states today, you naturally start to make decisions that align with the future you want for yourself. I believe vision and presence can coexist and I'm having to relearn to hold space for both. And I think that's really important for leadership. It's part of leading yourself well, is to recognize that you can hold space for your vision and take aligned action, and you can still sit and be present in the peace and the relaxation and the enjoyment of today. And oftentimes, that very thing that sitting in the presence of today opens doors. That lead to the opportunities you seek. You can still chase your dreams. And oftentimes by being present with the feeling states that you actually desire, you start to see more opportunities to feel that. And you chase that feeling, that sensation, which opens more and more doors that lead to the desires of your heart. So this would be a really good time to pause, and share that. Today's episode is actually sponsored by Manifesting and Mimosas, an upcoming vision board workshop where you spend intentional time doing exactly this kind of work, vision work. You're getting it out of your head and onto paper in community and guidance with those around you because clarity doesn't come from thinking harder. Or continuing to do more of the same clarity comes from slowing down long enough to see where you've been circling the block and deciding where you actually want to go. So if you've been craving space to pause, evaluate and intentionally map out your next season, I would love to guide you through that process. There are in-person and virtual tickets available for the workshop. You can find the link to grab your spot in the show notes or visit the mind her co.com and click the events tab. Now let's talk about why vision boards sometimes don't work. Have you ever made one and thought, this is not working. None of this has come to fruition? Are you a skeptic? Listen, I get it because I used to be one of you. And then I started making vision boards in 2015 and really shifting the way I approach vision work and everything has changed from that. So first, I think vision boards don't work because some people never actually make one. You can sit on the sidelines and say they don't work, but you've never made one unfollowed through with it. You assume that the clarity in your head is enough, but let me tell you when that direction lives only in your mind, it's competing with all other distractions day in and day out. The second reason I think vision boards don't work is because that they're rooted in the past rather than in your future. They're full of old photos, old identities, and old versions of yourself. Listen, I once had a workshop attendee who brought old college photos of herself to put on her board. She kept saying, I wanna get back to her. She was so great. Vision isn't about who you were, it's about who you are becoming. And the third reason I think vision boards often fail is because there's no alignment or action attached. A vision board isn't powerful just because you make one. It actually works. When you change something without reflection, it becomes decor. Something nice to look at or easy to ignore, right? And without decisions, it's just fantasy. It's this part of your imagination. Vision is meant to influence how you live your day-to-day life, how you spend your time, what you say yes to, and what you gently let go of. When your life starts to shift in really small and honest ways, that's when your vision really starts to become real. Remember vision and specifically your vision board, your GPS. It isn't about decoration, it's about direction. So when I sit down to create my vision board, as I've been doing for the last decade, there are several questions that I love to ask myself, and I'd love to share a few of those with you today. You can take these and write them down and revisit them as often as you need, or you can simply join the upcoming workshop and set aside intentional time to dig a bit deeper. So the first question is this, how do I want to feel in my life over the next year, and where can I begin experiencing that Now? The second question, if time, money and logistics weren't a concern, what would I want my life to include? Let yourself dream here. Don't censor yourself. And third, when I look back at the end of my life, what do I want to be able to say? I was brave enough to do this. Question is the one that guided me to quitting my corporate job and traveling the world. Listen, it was scary and it certainly didn't feel practical, but I knew I didn't want my story to be. I almost did that once. And then lastly, I'm gonna give you this fourth question'cause I think it's so important. What choice will future me wish she had made sooner? I wanna leave you with this. That snowy morning when I was driving around and circling the same block, I wasn't lost, I was distracted, I knew I was distracted. And sometimes the most powerful thing that you can do isn't to push harder, but it's to pause, to check your map, and to gently steer yourself back in the direction that you wanna go. Until next time, I am sending you so much love and gratitude. I hope to see you at the workshop. Thank you for listening.