Welcome 2025! We are a week into the new year, which already feels like a long time ago, but I hope you had a relaxing break and wish you much joy in the year that starts.
I haven’t made resolutions for years, mainly because I don’t want to deal with the guilt of dropping them some weeks later. Instead, I choose to develop a new competency that will help me be more present. In 2024, I decided to focus on three words: attention, intention and consistency. It wasn’t as straightforward as I expected. The hardest part for me was to be attentive. It was surprising how easy it was to be distracted by all the noise around me: alerts on my iWatch, reminders on the phone, and the consistent dripping of news. The list goes on and on. Distraction could be the biggest hurdle to living a fulfilled life.
Reflecting on it all, I realised that the noise is not only external; I flood my mind with worry. I am ‘pre-occupying’ my mind with stuff all the time: what will happen with my family, my ageing father, the economy, getting new clients, the divided world, the wars, etc. It hit me that worrying is my biggest distraction. So, what would it be like if I stopped worrying?
So, 2025 is a year where I want to avoid distraction. It is a tall order, and I chose Rabbi Abraham Joshua Heschel’s quote on radical amazement to guide me:
“Our goal should be to live life in radical amazement. … get up in the morning and look at the world in a way that takes nothing for granted. Everything is phenomenal; everything is incredible; never treat life casually. To be spiritual is to be amazed.”
This might be the antidote to the noise and help me break the cycle. I’ll let you know how it goes.
Welcome, 2025!
