You’ve heard about a Year Theme but don’t know what it is? This page will help you: It will explain what it is, how it can help you and how to make one yourself.
I have used this system of a Year Theme since 2017. It has helped me with my personal growth and becoming a better human. I’m sharing this knowledge so you can make positive changes as well to your life.
As a background: I learned the basic theory and expanded on it with other theories and personal development tools over the years. Tools that I will source to you (when usable).
What is a Year Theme
A Year Theme is one word or a short sentence which denotes your goals of the year. For me, it is a tradition that I’ve implemented to make the best of said new year. It provides structure and empowers to make decisions which improve your life. It is important that a theme is positively formulated, so it helps to create a better situation in a specific area of your life. In other words, it should imply personal growth.
As a sidenote: the concept of a Year Theme can be a bit “new-agey”, but you can make it as spiritual as you want. I just want to explain it in the best possible way with a minimal amount of fuzzy-wuzzyness to it. Let’s start with a video and move on from there.
New Year’s resolutions versus a Year Theme
You might be wondering: “why use a Year Theme. My New Year’s Resolution works fine!”
If your yearly Resolution works then I am happy for you. Though it might be that your resolution is not a Resolution but more of a Theme. Let me know how that works, because that is something I’m curious about!
Why I think that a New Year’s Resolution doesn’t work is that it’s usually relevant for a couple of weeks. In my experience this is like singing an “I want song”. Fun while it lasts, but mostly forgettable.
Like mentioned above a Year Theme is positively formulated and usually a little vague. This vagueness comes in the form of its formulation. So instead of Resolution “I want to lose 20kg” or “I want to be more healthy” you have the Theme “Year of Health” or “Joyful Movement”. The difference is that the Theme is not an I want song, it’s an I want book you write yourself. It helps you cultivate yourself, allowing you to learn more about yourself over the years and becoming a better human being.
To better understand it, it’s best to create one and try it. For a month, season or a year.
A Year Theme is deliberately vague. This is to help empower you. Make your decisions easier the moment you need to make them. As an example, the user of “Joyful Movement” Theme can go to a dance club, do Tai Chi or go out for frequent walks. Anything that makes you more joyful is allowed. And if a friend asks you to join at the Fast Food place and you cannot say no, take note of that but bend it into a reward. Make you feel like something you earned by walking of taking your bike to the restaurant. Incorporate movement in your lifestyle, whatever it may be. Mosty important here is your mindset: Do not consider the above example as cheating, but as a form of compensation to make incremental improvements.
Creating a Year Theme
Since a Year Theme can be a daunting thing to create so we need to make it easier. This can be done in several ways.
1. Evaluate your current (life) situation.
Look at your life and split it into 4 sections: Mental and Physical Health, relationships (love, family etc), work and money (your financial situation).
This is a simple way to look at your life and to divide it into sections. I learned it whilst participating in the personal development course of Dutch company 365 Dagen Succesvol. You can read a bit about them on my homepage.
Think, reflect about these parts of your life and grade each one from 1 to 10. Be honest about how each section is currently doing. When done, pick the lowest number.
Alternatively, you can also write each section on 4 pieces of paper and (literally) sit on them one at a time. Meditate on the subject, feel how your body and mind react to each section. Write everything that comes into your mind on a different piece of paper before you move on to the next section. Take about 10 minutes per section. Evaluate afterwards and take the one with the strongest reaction or that you feel has the greatest need for improvement.
2.Evaluate your previous year
When you work with a Year Theme it’s always wise to evaluate the previous year. This will allow you to specify your Theme. You can do this by answering some questions. Below are a few examples. It’s important to note that you take your time to answer these properly. Even if it takes a few days.
Question 1: What wasn’t the previous year about? Were there any goals that I set or activities I wanted to do on a frequent basis but didn’t accomplish?
Question 2: What did I discover or rediscover about myself
Question 3: What’s the challenge that I overcame? What was the biggest challenge last year?
Question 4: What made me the happiest? What gave the feeling of being most alive?
Question 5: What is the thing I’m most grateful for?
3.Use your personal mission and the Ikigai if you have it defined.
A lot can be said about this, and I’m not the expert. If you have a personal mission defined you can use it as well as a guiding principle to the place on the horizon you want to reach.
The same goes for the Venn Diagram based on the Ikigai principle. If you have it filled in it can be guiding as well. Just take note that this Venn Diagram is not really Ikigai. If you want to know more on Ikigai; please read this page. In short:
‘Ikigai translated into English as ‘life purpose’ sounds quite formidable, but ikigai need not be the one overriding purpose of a person’s life. In fact, the word life aligns more with daily life. In other words, ikigai can be about the joy a person finds living day-to-day, without which their life as a whole would not be a happy one.’
Akihiro Hasegawa (Ph.D. Clinical Psychologist)
4.Optional step: define your core values.
It’s good to know how you want to live your life. What is most important to you can be defined in a word. These words or values are what you live by. Remember that a word can have multiple interpretations, and it’s what’s important to you. There are plenty of lists on the internet. I found this one with 220 options. Choose the 4 or 5 that define you. Mine are Freedom, Open, Playfulness, Boldness.
Note that you can change them if they do not represent you in a couple of years. Pick a couple and test them by living your life.
5.Formulation.
When done with all or parts of the above you can start with formulating the Theme.
Remember that a Year Theme isn’t formulated in one night. Take your time and be thorough and honest with yourself. Follow these steps and see if you can formulate a short sentence or choose a word that encapsulates what you want that your next year is about.
Examples of my year themes: Heart’s fire (Hartenvuur); Connecting the Dots; Future Smart; Gardening.
You can use broad and slightly vague terminology to not set a path which can (and probably will) cause a block at some point when you need to make a decision. A devil’s choice where the only options you see, or paths to take are not to your liking.
Note that you can always create or change your Year theme when it isn’t working
As said in the Year Theme video I linked, the Year Theme needs to resonate with you. Be it a little scary since you don’t know what will happen or you get really excited about the things that can (and will) happen.
Solidify your Theme
To gave your Theme a bit more body or gravitas a song or visual aid can be used. It’s just a thing that helps you remember the Year Theme. Be it a desktop /phone background or a framed picture in your living / bedroom. You want to keep your theme alive in your perception.
A couple yours back I used the song Sogno di Volare (The Dream of Flight) to backup my theme of similar wording.
Coupled with the correct song a Theme can be a powerful motivator to make changes to your life. Nowadays I fill a new page on my flip over that stands in my living room. It is a personal statement of who I am and what my intentions are for the current year.
This works for me because I have it available when I need it and trust that my decisions will work for the better in the end. Yet I realize that being a little more active on the Year Theme front all year long will be to my benefit. So I encourage you to do so.
How to keep track of what you do
You can use journaling or vlogging to actively work on your Year Theme.If you need help I recommend you check out https://www.themesystem.com/. I haven’t personally used the system on display, but I recognise that it makes a Year Theme easier and helps to track progress in a simple way.
Should you have more questions don’t hesitate to contact me via my contact page.