Your Creative New Year Resolutions Guide
Different ways to kick off your visions and goals 🎉
I love New Year’s. I love the feeling of a new chapter, finding ways to evaluate and reset, and taking intentional time to reflect.
Where some people feel the stress and pressure of setting resolutions or making goals, I see a huge, wide-open field filled with possibilities. I usually spend all of January honing my goals and breaking down what I want to accomplish for the year.
I also choose a word to represent my goals and mindset for the year. In the past, these have included growth, intentionality, and clarity, among others. After much deliberation, I’ve decided my word for 2025 is NOURISH. I like to make sure my word can apply to all facets and corners of my life, and this one definitely fits the bill.
I want to nourish my body by switching to a diet focused on clean ingredients and whole foods and nourish my mind with reading, journaling, and meditation. I want to nourish my writing by continuing (and elevating) this newsletter, nourish my community by producing thoughtful and inspiring content, and nourish my relationships, my creativity, and my soul. This is going to be a year of gentle and slow impact.
To help you nourish your own resolutions and new year practices, I’ve compiled a bunch of my favorite resources, along with new ones I’m planning to try.
YEAR COMPASS: I’ve started the year by working through this (free) Year Compass booklet for the last three years. Filled with questions, exercises, and prompts, it helps you reflect on the past year and design a plan for your goals and dreams for the new one. I find myself returning to my pages (I do them in my journal instead of printing the booklet) and reconnecting with my goals all year long. It helps me stay aligned and focused throughout the year. I can’t recommend the process enough. 💫🧭
Ingrid Fettell Lee has made a career of studying Joy (I HIGHLY recommend her book!), and she’s now leading a 5-week online workshop, Wild Joy to Reclaim Your Joy, starting on January 6th. I’m pretty sure I need to sign up! 🎉
Mel Robbins Workbook: If you’re not familiar with Mel Robbins, she’s a motivational speaker, author, podcaster, and multihyphenate whose approach to personal growth is peppered with the tough love I sometimes need. I’ve used several of her free workbooks and often find them helpful to reorient myself with my goals and desires. You can listen to this podcast ep, How to Make Next Year the Best Year: Ask Yourself These 7 Questions, or check out her other workbook, Get What You Really Want. 📖
If you’re feeling a little woo-woo, here from Refinery29 is How To Manifest Your 2025 Goals, According to Your Zodiac Sign or their 2025 Tarot Spread. 🎴
If you wanna dive in further, check out tarot reader and psychic Sarah Potter who shares lots of resources and is available for different kinds of readings. 🔮
Open is a breathwork and meditation app that I’ve enjoyed using in the past. I’m more excited to dive into it now because they just announced that James Blake, one of my favorite musicians, has signed as Chief Sound Officer, making it a meditation platform for music lovers. The brand is launching a 21-day guided series called the Nervous System Reset that, according to the brand, is “designed to regulate emotions, quiet the mind, and make space for what’s next.” (You can get it for free on a 30 day trial.) This sounds like the perrrrrfect way to kick off the new year in a zen state of being. 🧘♀️
The Do It For Yourself Journal has lots of journaling prompts and exercises that are “designed to help reorient your outlook, overcome roadblocks, and encourage mindfulness, with powerful typographic quotes to inspire you along the way.” 📓
IT’S VISION BOARD SZN, BABYYYYY! I. LOVE. A vision board. As a highly visual thinker, finding images that pair with my goals and dreams is so soothing, inspiring, and helpful. You can make a tactile one by cutting and pasting shots from magazines or digitally using Canva, Photoshop, or Pinterest. I find making vision boards an extremely beneficial and satisfying process.
Not sure where to start? Here’s a little Guide on How To Make a Vision Board ✨
If you REALLY want to dive in, check out The Source: The Secrets of the Universe, the Science of the Brain by Tara Swart. Its all about using the tools of manifestation and visualization to help us become our most authentic selves. 💓
OR you can just watch this 3-minute TikTok breaking down how to use this ideology to make an effective vision board. 👌
I also LOVE using my little Canon Ivy Mini Photo Printer to print out really specific images or photos I want to use! 🖼️
If you want something super low lift, here’s a free downloadable template to print out and fill in. 🖨️
From Passion Planner, here are some helpful tools: End of the Year Checklist and Vision Board Tips. ✅
I have a perpetually spilling-over TBR stack, with non-fiction and self-improvement being my most-read category. Here’s what’s on the roster regarding fueling myself and my life in the new year.
I’m So Effing Tired: A Proven Plan to Beat Burnout, Boost Your Energy, and Reclaim Your Life by Amy Shah MD
My Dad just gifted me a copy of this book and I can’t wait to read it. 😴
How to Do Nothing: Resisting the Attention Economy by Jenny Odell
This has been collecting dust on my bookshelf since its 2020 release, and I’m finally committing. My career revolves around being chronically online, as do many of my interests and hobbies. While I need to stay digitally active, I’m overdue for a reset of my boundaries and intentions. 🛌
Healthier Together: Recipes for Two — Nourish Your Body, Nourish Your Relationships by Liz Moody
Redefining our habits with food and cooking is the big household goal for Ben and me this year, so I’m excited to cook up recipes from this book together and to trade Postmates for healthy romantic dinners at home. 👩🍳👨🍳
Good Energy: The Surprising Connections Between Metabolism and Limitless Health by Casey Means
As I mentioned recently, I’ve been on a health journey, deeply struggling with fatigue. Regaining my energy and reclaiming my health is the TOP priority for 2025, and I’ve heard great things about this book. 🌀
The Shadow Work Journal: A Guide to Integrate and Transcend Your Shadows by Keila Shaheen
Squarely placed in the TikTok Made Me Do It category, this viral journal is “an empowering and compassionate tool to help you face and overcome the obstacles and limiting self-beliefs that are holding you back from achieving your true potential.” I’m curious to see how this goes. 👥
Honorable Mention 🏆
Real Self Care: A Transformative Program for Redefining Wellness (Crystals, Cleanses and Bubble Baths Not Included) by Pooja Lakshmin
I read this earlier this year, but it was insanely helpful in shifting my mindset about what caring for ourselves looks like. Forbes called it the "Greatest Self-Help Books of All Time." I plan on revisiting many of the exercises/PDFs she references in the book. 🧖♀️
I would love to hear from you all! What are your words, resolutions and goals for 2025?! Do you have any resources or tactics I should try?
Need to read - do - all these
Thank you for this 2025 kick off 🙏 wisdom to tap over and over ✨️💕🕯