I’m not big on New Year’s Resolutions in the traditional sense, but I do love taking this time to take stock of how things are going, contemplate what I’d like more of in my life, and sometimes make concrete plans of what that could look like. The fresh start effect is huge for me, and whenever there’s an external milestone like New Years I love to make use of it for momentum if there’s any shifts I’ve been considering making in my life.
My favorite thing is to choose a single word that feels like it can be a touchstone/shorthand for what I’m trying to increase in my life in the coming year. I come back to the word all year as I am making decisions about where to spend my time or whenever I’m feeling a bit unmoored.
For 2025 I’m thinking my word might be “warmth” - I'd like to bring more earnestness, connection, authenticity, activation, and energy into my life this year, and that word feels like a good shorthand for all of that.
There are some key differences between how I approach this process now and how I used to set New Year's Resolutions:
I used to come to setting resolutions from shame, thinking about what was wrong with me that I needed to fix - this is not only really mean to myself, but it’s a motivation killer. A focus on appreciation of what is and reflection on what I’d like more of has been much more generative. I used to set very ambitious goals that involved major changes in behavior, when incremental/gradual shifts are far more effective. When thinking about making changes, I used to focus on ‘shoulds’ and the chagrin I had at not doing enough of what I thought I ought to be doing - but when I instead think more about what would feel intrinsically good to do, about taking care of myself from a place of love, or reflecting on what needs my current 'less desirable' behavior might be meeting that I might need a replacement for, I’m often able to find joy in the process, which makes it much more sustainable. When inevitably I went “off track” quickly after New Years, I used to feel even more shame and add more negativity to my internal narrative. When I think of my plans as life enhancing possibilities that I get to try, not directives, there doesn’t need to be guilt if they don’t work out this time - it’s more information I can use to go back to the drawing board and keep iterating.
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