How are we going to see 2024
I’ve never been one for new year’s resolutions. I am going to Reimagine 2024 without resolutions. They have always seemed arbitrary and a bit pointless. After all, who hasn’t been to the gym in January, waiting forever to use our favorite machines, only to find it a ghost town in February? Or started that stereotypical diet on the first of the year, only to be back at the old habits two weeks later? The inability to maintain good behaviors, whatever they are, is nothing more than a new year’s trope. I gave up many years ago making new year’s resolutions. However, this year I am using the Bullet Journal methods to restructure my life.
And yet the beginning of a year does seem like a good time to reevaluate, to reassess…to re-something.
I hang out with a lot of scientists, artists, writers and designers, and many of them select a word of the year. It’s a theme, a north star, a key value they can return to (re-turn? Makes sense) as the year progresses. I’ve been playing around with the idea and, while I tend to rebel (re-bel? Not a thing) against the crowd, I confess I like the idea.
Let’s Reimagine 2024
And so I’ve selected my 2024 word: Reimagine.
I have imagined myself many times. In high school, I imagined myself first as an athlete —until my right knee was injured in an intentional take out move. Then I imagined myself as a medical doctor, followed by being a scientist. In 1978, I chose to leave school and do computers squelched those dreams. Spent many years imagining myself as a great programmer. Only to suffer being sabotaged by my coworkers. They suffered the sin of envy! I wrote really good programs!
My imagination has run wild since then, encompassing many, many personas—many outcomes: scientist, artist, teacher, divorcée, counselor, griever, entrepreneur, grandfather, teacher, designer, auto and motorcycle restorer, businessman, speaker, author.
I picture myself standing with these projects unfulfilled, like some nutter gone terribly wrong. Covered in words and titles that purport to identify me, to label me. I sometimes feel spread too thin!
About Me
What about you? What labels do you write and attach to yourself? Are you also covered in neon pink and green and orange and yellow sticky notes? Are the words you’ve attached to yourself what the world sees and thinks about you? Can we truly be reduced (re-duced? Nah…not a word) to simple personas or job titles? Are your resolutions (re-solutions? Did the first ones not work?) simply new sticky notes, updated and narrow ways to label yourself? I have a ton of lists where the tasks did not get done!
Because words matter, let’s be careful how we apply them to ourselves. As we consider the new year and how we want to show up, be perceived, and effect change, can we select words that neither constrict nor aggrandize us?
Resolutions are limited. I want to decide first who I want to be and then set myself goals that move me toward becoming that person. And since those things may change over the next 364 days, I want to reimagine myself every morning.
Words matter. Whether we have identified resolutions, goals, or a 2024 word, perhaps it is best if we follow Epictetus, a first century Greek Stoic. He wrote, “First say to yourself what you would be; and then do what you have to do.”
January 1st may be an arbitrary starting point, but hey—it’s as good a day as any. Strip off the sticky notes. Re-something, anything.
Imagine who you can become.
Extracted and modified for me from Cindy Villanueva.
Thank You Cindy!
