Vision Edit: The Art of Becoming

Before we sprint into January with the kind of delusional optimism that convinces us we’ll suddenly become 5am-Pilates-matcha people, there’s something far more foundational that has to come first. It’s not mood boards, pretty collages or even setting up a fresh 2026 discbound.

It’s the blueprint. This is the part where you begin imagining the shape of your life in a way that can actually support you as you are today and as you want to be in the near future. So often we look at ourselves like an old house that just needs some new floors and a coat of paint. We try to rework the old version of ourselves or sanding down last year’s rough edges. Instead, I invite you to take a moment,  step back, look honestly at the layout of your life, and start designing something new: something intentional, supportive, and capable of holding the weight of who you’re becoming.

Instead of thinking about self-development like you’re constantly repairing leaks in a house you didn’t even want to live in, this is your chance to think like an architect. You get to choose the good materials (not the “builder-grade personality traits” you’ve been handed), decide how you want your days to move, and sketch a structure that doesn’t immediately collapse the second life gets heavy. Each day becomes a small, intentional stroke on your blueprint, gradually shaping a version of you that feels sturdy, spacious, and aligned with the future you want to step into.

Your Planner Is a Drafting Table

Your planner is not a notebook or pile of paper and stickers. It can be the drafting table for your life. Every insert you select is a building material; every section you create is a floor plan; every intention you jot down becomes a structural beam. When you start seeing planning as an act of intentional design you unlock an entirely different level of clarity. You’re no longer trying to contort yourself into someone else’s method or “aesthetic.” You’re choosing the structure that fits you. This is why the Build a Custom Planner tool is such a gift. It allows you to lay out your system the same way an architect lays out a build: intentionally, piece by piece, with consideration for purpose, flow, and what the structure needs to endure. You stop trying to squeeze your life into the wrong mold and start building something that aligns with the way you think.

Your Life Has Load-Bearing Habits

In architecture, removing a load-bearing wall compromises the entire building. In life, ignoring your load-bearing habits has the same effect. These are the habits that stabilize everything else even when your schedule shifts, your energy dips, or your plans get derailed. The trick is being honest about what is actually structural. Buying new pens? Fun. Using your planner consistently? Structural. Romanticizing your routines? Cute. Creating boundaries around your time? Structural. It’s easy to fill our days with decorative habits that feel good but don’t actually support us. Becoming requires identifying the habits that truly hold things up and reinforcing those first. Building a custom planner makes this easier by allowing you to prioritize inserts and layouts that support your structural habits instead of distracting you with ones that simply look good on your desk.

Draft One Is Never the Final Build

Architects don’t complete a building off the first sketch, and you shouldn’t expect yourself to either. Your first version of a routine, a workflow, or a planning system will never be the final version. And that’s not only okay, it’s encouraged. When something didn’t work last year, it wasn’t a personal failure; it was a signal. It showed you where the design wasn’t strong enough, where the flow wasn’t realistic, or where the structure wasn’t fully aligned with your actual life. Becoming your best “you” happens through revision. You are going to need to adjust, reinforce, remove, and reimagine as you go. This is one reason I love my monthly Intention Box. Month after month, it delivers new materials, layouts, and tools that encourage me to refine my blueprint, experiment with structure, and evolve my system in real time.

Structural Reality > Aesthetic Dreams 

A vision board tells you what you want; a blueprint tells you how to build a life that can actually support it. Anyone can pin a photo of a serene morning routine, but the real question is: what is that photo asking you to change structurally? Do you need earlier nights so you aren’t waking up already behind? Do you need fewer decisions in the morning so your brain isn’t negotiating with itself before coffee? Do you need a calmer start, or simply a routine that doesn’t involve sprinting around the house hunting for keys, dignity, and a matching pair of socks? The same thing happens with workspace inspiration. The picture of a minimalist, perfectly organized desk is gorgeous, but the true blueprint behind it is clearing the clutter once a week, not buying yet another keyboard because it has better “clickity-clacks”. Aesthetics are great for mood, but blueprints are great for reality. They don’t care about how pretty something looks; they care about whether the structure underneath can hold up when you're tired, stressed, busy, or hangry. Becoming you happens in the choices you make every day, and in the systems that support you long after the vision board comes down.

Build a Better Tuesday

A good Tuesday is worth more than a perfect January. Anyone can design a beautiful “new era” or map out a dreamy weekend routine, but the real transformation happens when you create a Tuesday that doesn’t fall apart before lunch. And yes, it specifically needs to be Tuesday, because Tuesday is the most honest day of the week. Monday is all performance and ambition. Wednesday is chaos. Thursday is “almost Friday,” and Friday is basically pretend. Weekends are pure delusion wrapped in loungewear.

But Tuesday? Tuesday is where your actual life shows up. The motivation from Monday is fading, yet the full chaos of the week hasn’t peaked. Tuesdays are the day your real life shows up with the emails, the errands, the chaos, the toddler meltdowns, the work shifts, the surprises, and the tiny cracks where your systems either hold… or don’t.

The day you play most on repeat will end up being the backbone of everything. If that day is clear, supportive, calm enough to navigate without stress-sweating by 10:03AM, then the rest of your year becomes exponentially easier to build. One stable day replicates itself, quietly reinforcing your foundation over and over until suddenly you’re living a life that feels crafted instead of chaotic.

This is where the Daily Intention Inserts really shine. They help you draft a day that actually supports you, your energy, your bandwidth, your real schedule and not the fantasy version you write during a moment of motivation. They force you to think like an architect: Where does my time actually go? What needs reinforcing? What needs simplifying? What needs to be thrown directly into the sun? Designing a functional Tuesday will change your life more than any inspirational pinboard ever will. Tuesdays are the load-bearing wall of your entire week and that is a hill I am willing to die on.

How to Build Your 2026 Blueprint (Step-by-Step)

1. Identify your load-bearing habits.
   
   These are the habits that actually keep your life from collapsing. Think of sleep, planning, hydration, movement, work, meals, etc. Load-bearing habits are the routines that hold the entire structure of your week together, even when everything else is giving “plot twist.” Once you spot them, you can stop pretending those supplements you bought from a mall kiosk is the solution and start reinforcing the habits that truly matter.
   
   
2. Find the structural weak points.
   
   Every life has them: the places where things consistently crack, wobble, or fully give out like a WWE folding chair. Maybe your mornings are chaos, maybe your time management is a suggestion, or maybe every Thursday you mysteriously forget you’re a person with responsibilities. Whatever the weak points are, call them out. These aren’t failures, so choose not to view it that way. These are spaces to create better, stronger structure.
   
   
3. Redraw your default day.
   
   This is your chance to stop designing for “fantasy you” and start designing for “actual you,” the version who wakes up tired, gets distracted easily, and still needs three reminders to switch the laundry. Your default day should match your real energy, your real bandwidth, and the way your life actually flows rather than the way you wish it would behave if it were better trained. Sketch out a Tuesday (yes, Tuesday) that feels doable, calm-ish, and not reliant on a miracle to function. Pick that one, foundational day to perfect your structure. Then take what works and apply it to the rest.
   
   
4. Rebuild with the right materials.
   
   This is where you stop buying systems because they looked pretty on someone else’s feed and start choosing inserts, dashboards, and layouts that actually work for you. Your brain is unique and your planner should be too. Use the Custom Planner Builder like an architect choosing the right beams and supports. Do you need structure? Flexibility? White space? More lists? Fewer? No one knows better than you. Pick what makes your life easier, not what makes your desk look like a Pinterest mood board. And don’t worry if it looks simple at first. The decor comes after you build the walls.
   
   
5. Establish a monthly revision ritual.
   
   Architects revise constantly as building are being built and so should you. Once a month, take stock: what worked, what flopped, what needs reinforcing, and what needs to be thrown into the metaphorical dumpster out back. Let each Intention Box delivery be your cue to audit. It’s your invitation to adjust, refine, and rebuild as needed, because good design evolves. Your life isn’t static and your systems shouldn’t be either. 

So this is your assignment: stop trying to “be better” and start building better. Forget the fantasy era and focus on the Tuesday that holds. Reinforce what works, demolish what doesn’t, and design a life that can actually carry the weight of who you’re becoming. The blueprint is in your hands now so make it sturdy, make it intentional, and make it something Future You can be obnoxiously smug about ;)