Hello 2025
— theme: Find your balance —
In the past, I’ve taken an all-or-nothing mindset toward a lot of things, oscillating between two extremes. One example: If I’m no longer a shopaholic, I must be a minimalist, right? I’m the type of person who finds a lot of comfort in categorizing things. While this can result in more efficient decision-making, it can also lead to black-or-white thinking. To me, it’s a manifestation of urgency (I have to rush to make a decision about who I am) and perfection (I have to be unwavering in my resolve) — two mental models I’ve been working on letting go of.
In 2025, I want to live a life that is increasingly nuanced. I want to be more comfortable in uncertainty and not be in such a hurry to figure things out. I want to balance being curious and open-minded with being clear and boundaried. I want to balance saving with spending, intentionally using my money in a way that brings me safety and joy. I want to balance staying connected with my loved ones with having enough time for myself. In short, I want to find my “just-right” in each unique situation so I can feel at ease and at peace.
— GOALS —
This year, my goals are all around living ordinary life — no big projects and no striving. I want to lean into learning how to enjoy daily life, without needing the dopamine fix of achievement. I’ve set seven goals for everyday things I want to accomplish in 2025. These goals don’t have to be directly be related to my annual theme — they’re simply things I want to do this year. After making this list, I noticed that a lot of my goals relate to organization, which I believe will help create balance in my home and within myself.
#1: Choose more offline activities
I experienced a lot of eye strain toward the end of 2024. I realized that I’ve shifted a lot of my activities online, and the increased screen time could be contributing to my eye strain. In 2025, I’d like to spend more time each day doing offline activities. This could include colouring, solving a jigsaw puzzle, reading a physical book, making something delicious, going for a walk, or doing some stretching.
#2: Reorganize a few areas in my home
Hubby and I sold and decluttered a lot in 2024, but we also bought a bunch of things. I’d like to spend some time reorganizing our condo. Here are the areas I’d like to pay some special attention to:
The wall unit — We have some different interests now and I want to make room for our new hobbies (puzzles and Lego!).
The plant area — We have a lot of storage containers in this area that I feel can be organized more effectively.
The kitchen — I’d like to find a permanent home for hubby’s new glass lunch containers and my new cozy plates.
The locker — We have a locker full of stuff! I’d like to go through it and declutter the things we no longer need or want.
#3: Figure out my photos
Here are the things I’d like to figure out:
I want to find a new way to organize the photos from my photo-a-day project of hubby and me. I used to make photo calendars — but these are very time consuming so I’ve been bottlenecked as of 2022. I want to find an easier way to organize the photos so they’re still fun for me to look through.
I found a photo album of my family that’s only partly full. I’d like to fill that up.
I have two boxes of old photos I’d like to sort through.
#4: Find a way to track my media consumption
This is a strange way of saying that I want to make lists of the books I read and the movies/shows I watch. In 2024, I tracked the books I read in my goals post but I found the process simultaneously clunky and not detailed enough. I’d like to find a better way to track the books I read in 2025. I also want to track the movies and shows I watch. This is purely for interest. I like know how long ago I read or watched something. Plus I often forget so I’d like to add a few notes to jog my memory.
#5: Continue to track my caffeine and alcohol consumption
My 2024 tracking led to a lot of fascinating insights and self-reflection so I’m not ready to let it go. But I’m not doing this to further lower my caffeine and alcohol consumption. Instead, I’m simply observing myself with no judgment or shame. Again, this is purely for interest. I’m very curious about why I choose to continue to drink caffeine and alcohol when neither makes me feel very good. So this year, I’ll be adding a few notes around each decision point.
#6: Choose one exercise from ABR to complete every month
It’s only been a couple of months since my authenblissity reset so I’m going to take a break before doing another full reset. In the meantime, I want to keep the concepts top of mind — so I’m going to choose one ABR exercise each month to work through. I’m not sure whether I’ll go in chapter order, select an exercise based on what I want to work on, or choose randomly. My book was designed to be able to be used in all these ways so I’m eager to give it a try.
#7: Create a list of questions to answer every three years
One thing I’ve been trying to balance is referencing external sources of information with trusting my own inner compass. I’ve been answering this set of 50 questions since 2013. While I’ve learned a lot about myself through this process, I’ve been wanting to create my own set of questions for a while now. This is the year!
— PRACTICES —
I’ll be experimenting with three practices in 2025. At the end of the year, I’ll decide whether I want to continue with the practice, tweak it, or let it go.
#1: DAILY REFLECTION
I change up my daily reflection question every year to align with my annual theme. In 2025, I’m going to ask myself this question at the end of each day: “How did you create balance for yourself today?”
#2: Me-time Monday
Me-Time Monday is a new discovery from my 31 Days to 2025 challenge. The idea is to do one thing for myself every Monday, anything I like. I can nap, read, take a bath, go for a walk, doodle, listen to music, do a puzzle, the list goes on. It’s up to me to decide what to do and how much time to spend on the activity. The only “rule” is to listen deeply to what I truly want to do.
#3: No-plans week
No-Plans Week is also a new discovery. I first tried it last May during my birthday week, and I enjoyed it so much that I made it a regular monthly recurrence in my calendar. The idea is simple — I don’t make plans during this week. It’s the same week as my period so I’m feeling pretty ill — that’s the main reason I don’t want to make any commitments, even if they’re things I’d usually look forward to. In 2024, I ended up making a bunch of exceptions, so in 2025, I’d like to try harder to respect this time for my physical, mental, and emotional rest.
This month’s reflective questions
If you could do anything at all — because you truly want to, not because you think you should — what would you do? With that in mind, what are some easy, true-to-you, fun goals that you want to work toward in 2025?
Here’s to a year of balance,
