It’s January 2nd. The hangover has petered down into a mild headache. Declarations of “Never again” have been made. It’s time to turn the not-so-bleary-anymore eye to what lies ahead and make some New Year Resolutions.
While New Year Resolutions are routinely ridiculed because of their high failure rate, in a recent newsletter, author David Epstein wrote about why they are, in fact, a great idea. “Rather than perceiving our lives as a continuous river of time, we construct our inner autobiographies more like a staircase, punctuated by important dates, dramatic events, and first experiences,” writes Epstein.
While a 2007 survey showed that 80 per cent of New Year Resolutions failed, Epstein points out that it is pretty incredible that 20 per cent of people made a change thanks to the so-called arbitrary act of setting a goal as the calendar switched to a New Year.
My own experience with New Year Resolutions puts me among the 80 per cent. If I had succeeded, then by now, I would’ve regularly run half-marathons, wrote books (fiction and non-fiction), contributed to prestigious publications, went on treks to the Himalayas once a year, have an incredible bank balance due to astute investments, and check on ‘Slim Fit’ while looking for shirts online.
However, the failure to stick to resolutions is only part of the problem. The more insidious issue is that by failing at them repeatedly, I had come to believe that I’m just not capable of sticking to New Year Resolutions, which represent some of the most meaningful ways in which I want to shape my life. So, I either did not take them seriously – “Oh, I’m anyway going to fail” – or was in a state of constant anxiety – “Oh my god, is this day I finally fall off the bandwagon!”
Enter Yearly Themes
A couple of years ago, on an episode of Cortex – a monthly podcast by CGP Grey and Mike Hurley – I heard about Yearly Themes. Like me, the podcast hosts had been disillusioned by New Year Resolutions. They proposed an alternative: Set Yearly Themes instead of Resolutions. (Check out Grey’s video on Yearly Themes.)
As the name suggests, ‘themes’ are fuzzier than ‘resolutions’. They represent the change you want to bring about in your life – without defining specific goals. As Grey puts it, “Instead of saying I am going to lose X pounds by next year or saying I am going to read one book a week at least, a theme would be something like ‘A Year of Reading’ or ‘A Year of Health’. Now, if that sounds broad, that’s the point.”
Let’s say you set a goal to lose 10 kg in 2022. You dive deep. You set monthly weight-loss targets. You figure out how many minutes you need to exercise or your calorie input for each day. Then, you get going in January. In February, a huge project comes along. You are working harder. You don’t have the time to exercise an hour a day for the next few weeks. You don’t exercise for a week, then another, and then another. You’ve missed February’s target. The subliminal message is that you’re going to miss December’s target as well. The goal appears to be getting tougher and more challenging, and your motivation drops.
Instead, a Yearly Theme like ‘A Year of Health’ is more adaptable. Don’t have time to exercise for an hour? How about 15 minutes? Not even that? Maybe, you can park the car a bit farther away from the office and log more steps. Maybe, you can skip the whipped cream on top of that cold coffee. As long as you can keep the theme in mind (which is essential), you can figure out alternative ways – big and small – to stay healthy.
Themes also encourage us to think about our systems – the things we do regularly – rather than goals – the things we achieve. As Scott Adams, the creator of Dilbert, puts it, “The goals people are fighting the feeling of discouragement at each turn. The systems people are feeling good every time they apply their system. That’s a big difference in terms of maintaining your personal energy in the right direction.”
And the direction is what ultimately matters. “When you are trying to build a better version of yourself, exact data points do not matter. All that matters is the trend line,” says Grey.
My Yearly Themes
This brings me to my Yearly Themes. In 2021, I adopted two themes.
1) The Year of Small Actions
This helped me in countless ways. I faced some challenging personal issues this year. I don’t think I could have created or exercised as much as I did without thinking in terms of ‘Small Actions’. I walked wherever I could. I worked in small pockets of time. I made 5-minute phone calls to stay in touch with loved ones. I don’t think I achieved any grand results. But I have changed a bit for the better – and that matters.
2) The Year of Measurement
My focus on the second theme has helped me get into the habit of tracking my time in my work life. This has motivated me to work on my independent projects, where I don’t have a team, clients, or deadlines to provide any structure. I also wanted to track my habits. I failed at it – but that’s something I want to work on in 2022.
My new theme for the coming year is – drumroll – The Year of Satisfaction.
In 2021, I consumed content and contemplated the idea of happiness. Based on this, I have come up with a hypothesis:
When I say I want to be “happy”, I truly mean that I don’t want to feel dissatisfied. (This is not true in every situation. But it is true in many if not most situations.)
Satisfaction can be cultivated. That is, I can learn to be more satisfied, no matter what situation I find myself in.
If I believe that putting in the work (any work) will bring satisfaction despite the results, then I will be more motivated to put in the work.
I do have a specific goal to cultivate satisfaction. I want to journal regularly this year, noting what work I put in each day and how that brought satisfaction to me. However, this could also take less concrete or different forms – like taking the time to feel satisfied after I have gone out for a walk or read a few pages from a book each day.
And that kind of adaptability is the point of having Yearly Themes. As CGP Grey puts it, “Having a theme is like creating a friendly bot to follow you on a path, to help notice branches and consider choices with you, reminding you to be a little different in little moments sometimes.”
Do check out his excellent video on the topic. You can also listen to Grey and Mike’s Yearly Themes for 2022 here.
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