New Year Resolutions

The title says it all isn’t it? You know what I am going to talk about.

Do you believe in listing out resolutions every year?

Or you don’t believe in resolutions at all?

If you believed in resolutions, how effective have they been? – Very effective? Not so effective? Ok-Ok??

It is that beautiful time of the year. People welcome the coming New Year with lots of hope, aspirations, zest and enthusiasm. Most people come up with their own resolutions too. Some people very sincerely seriously adhere to them. And some other people, I don’t need to say J.

The social media is full of greetings and images for the Ney Year. And of course there are jokes and memes on resolutions too. For example, the fitness freaks would say, they would not like to go to the gym on the 1^st of Jan, as it would be filled with people who would have chosen going to their gym as their resolution. And they would also be sure that the same enthusiasm will not last till the 2^nd of Jan. J.

Let me start with my disclaimer: I am no fan of New Year Resolutions!

Having said that, I have been observing a socially active friend of mine who would religiously put up a concept of a single word focus for the year at the beginning of the year.

Yes – a single word. It is not a resolution. Just a single word to define the focus for the year.

I became curious. How does it work?

I even debated with him – how can it be just a single word? Can it be a combination of a few? Can it be a sentence? The manager in me made me even ask - Can it be a list of bullet points? J

My wise friend wasn’t impressed – he said it doesn’t work that way. It has to be a single word!

Hmm, an interesting concept. That led me to think. Think hard.  You need to think of a single word that is going to determine the entire direction of the whole year. Wow!

Yes, it is a brilliant idea. To arrive at that single word – one goes through lots of emotions and thought processes. It is like writing the Vision/Mission statement for your Company.

Ultimately when you narrow down to the single word focus for the year, you would have gone through quite a bit of feelings, logical reasoning, analysis, intuition, goals, ambition, wishes, dreams etc.. Yet a single word. Thank you my friend!

You know what, I have been practicing this concept for nearly four years now. And it works!

I have also been talking about this concept with my close friends and many of them have adopted it as well. For example, one friend told me he had chosen "Consolidation" as his word as he wanted to consolidate his many physical assets, financials, work life balance and so on. 

Another, a very successful one and arrived well in life early, yet grappling with mid life crises, mentioned "Minimalism" as his word. 

Both of them did exactly what they mentioned! And many such. 

Friends, I have thought of mine. That one word. For the year 2019.

Would you like to give it a try?

A Happy New Year to you!