Sansuke
Did you know the concept of ‘New Year’s Resolution’ dates back thousands of years to ancient Babylonians, who made promises to their goods at the start of each year to pay the debts and return borrowed items.
The tradition evolved over time and became more widespread with various cultures adopting their own versions of making commitments or setting goals at the beginning of a new year.
What’s so special about the New Year?
- The New Year marks the start of a fresh calendar year, often symbolizing new beginnings, opportunities and a chance for personal growth or change.
- It’s a time when many people reflect on the past year, set goals for the future and embrace the idea of starting anew.
Did you know? If you’re an anime enthusiast, your favorite anime series can surprisingly be useful guide with new year planning and goal setting.
Let’s begin our, New Year Planning and Goal Setting with Anime
1. Self-reflection ft. ReLIFE
Self-reflection is mandatory to start your new year planning. It enables you to celebrate your achievements and learn from your failures.
Taking time for self-reflection helps clarify your priorities and the direction you want to take in the new year.
It provides a clearer vision of what you want to achieve and how to go about it.
It helps you evaluate your accomplishments, challenges, success and areas that need improvement.
This assessment provides insights into what works well and what didn’t guiding your future decisions.
Arata Kaizaki from ReLIFE is a hopeless 27 year-old NEET who struggles with unemployment gets a mysterious opportunity to relive one year of his high school life.
Being placed in a high school environment again, helps him to revaluate his past mistakes and bad decisions that caused him to live the unsatisfied and hopeless life he knows and tries to make different choices this time around.
2. It’s Time to start Crossing off your Bucket List ft. Zom 100: Bucket List of the Dead
Bucket list is list of things an individual wants to accomplish before they ‘kick the bucket’ and hence the anime ‘bucket list’.
These list of things can be experiences they wish to live or achievements they want to accomplish or places they want to visit or see within their lifetime.
They often include a variety of goals, dreams and aspirations, ranging from adventurous activities like skydiving or traveling to specific destinations or personal milestones like learning a new language or writing a book.
Everyone has a unique bucket list of their own. It comes in handy since it can act as a guide for setting goals in the new year.
By reviewing and selecting items from your bucket list, you can establish specific, achievable goals for the upcoming year.
This method allows you to focus on experiences or achievements that’re personally meaningful and bring a sense of fulfillment as you work towards crossing them off your list throughout the year.
If you still need help creating your bucket list if you didn’t have one already? I have just the anime recommendation to help with that, Zom 100: Bucket List of the Dead.
Don’t shy away from taking inspiration from Akira Tendo’s list of hundred things he wishes to accomplish before he kicks the bucket or to put it plainly before he becomes a zombie.
3. Cheers to New Beginnings+ Making a Change ft. A Silent Voice
Like I said at the beginning, the New Year marks the start of a fresh calendar year often symbolizing new beginnings, signifying hope, renewal and a chance to make positive changes in one’s life.
With this new year approaching us, you’ve the opportunity to wright the wrongs of last year, leave all your past regrets behind, it’s time to finally burry the hatchet and make a fresh start with a clean slate.
A Silent Voice anime is the prime example of making a change, apologizing for past mistakes and opening door to new beginnings.
A Silent Voice portrays the journey of Shoya Ishida, a former bully and his quest at redemption at making amends and righting his wrongs for the pain he caused to a deaf girl named Shoko Nishimiya.
4. It’s high time you started seizing opportunities ft. A Place Further than the Universe
You know in life? opportunities are tough to come by and when they do grab onto them like your life depends on it. But we don’t do that? do we? When we get an opportunity, we should take it but what do we do?
We say, nah let’s let this one go, we’ll get another one soon enough and then that one also comes and we let that one go too.
Eventually we’re left with regret and the overwhelming weight of missed opportunities tormenting our mind.
A character that comes to mind when it comes to seizing opportunities is Shirase Kobuchizawa, who is a bold and passionate high school girl with a dream to visit Antarctica.
She is so determined to visit Antarctica that she takes on as many odd jobs as she can to earn one million yen while biting her timing to get a chance to be part of the Antarctica expedition.
Even when everyone around her calls her crazy for having such unrealistic dream, she stays true to her goals and does what she can today while passionately waiting for an opportunity.
In life, we often get too fixated on what we want to do tomorrow, we miss out on what we need to do today. Everyone’s been a victim of this including me.
So just like Shirase, we should start working on things we can accomplish today since tomorrow is yet to come, take one day at time.
It’s nice planning for the future but it’s of no use if you fail to do the work today.
5. Actively try out new things ft. Mari Tamaki
Mari is a high school girl from the anime A Place Further than the Universe who live a very boring life doing the same thing everyday.
Mari though being self-aware and with a desire to make the most of her youth instead of letting it pass by doing the same thing everyday, she often gets scared by the thought of entering a new territory to bring that change.
Mari really wants to try out new things and visit new places but she is often held back by thought and worries of failures or leaving her comfort zone leading her to back down at the last second.
Mari even gets scared by the thought of ditching school for one day.
Watch anime to see if she is able to overcome her doubts and go on the journey of a lifetime.
If you’ve already found what you love to do? then we’ll and good, try to set goals to achieve or become better at them but if you’re someone whose still haven’t figured it all out? don’t worry, no pressure use this new year planning as an opportunity to try out new things.
Don’t be afraid of experimenting. Don’t stress if you can’t find that thing in the first few things you tried, life has a way of doing things.
So instead try as many things you can, sit back and let things that is meant for you find you cause the things you’re seeking is also seeking you.
6. Become the Best Version of Yourself ft. Blue Lock
Becoming the best version of yourself simply means striving to be the happiest, most fulfilled and authentic person you can be.
How to become the best versions of yourself?
a) Self-awareness ft. Yoichi Isagi
Know your strength, weaknesses, dreams and areas of improvement.
Isagi from Blue Lock is well-aware of the areas he lacks in like stamina and unaware of his special weapon. So he makes plans to improve his on field endurance and figure out his special weapon.
b) Setting goals and values ft. Yoichi Isagi
After analyzing yourself, it’s time to set concrete but achievable goals that matter you the most.
Yoichi Isagi from Blue Lock sets it straight he wants to become the best striker in the world, a lofty dream but atleast he is true to his belief.
c) Build Healthy Relationships ft. Isagi x Bachira
Stay away from toxic relationship instead invest in fostering caring, understanding and supportive relationships.
Bachira and Isagi’s relationships is competitive, supportive and compliments each other egos.
d) Maintain physical well-being ft. Rin Itosi
Take care of your body through exercise, proper nutrition and adequate rest.
Rin from Blue Lock comes to mind when it comes to maintaining physical well-being. He ensures to have a balance between practice and rest sessions often involving meditation sessions after practice.
Trying to become the best version of yourself doesn’t mean you need to completely overwork yourself and ultimately making your life a living hell.
Don’t forget life’s a marathon not a race. Practicing self-care is of utmost priority, if you don’t want to go crazy.
Prioritize your well-being, get enough rest, eat healthy, exercise regularly and manage stress effectively.
Try to maintain work-life balance by having having productive weekdays, make weekend plans, go out with loved ones or friends, socialize and don’t forget to eat fulfilling food.
Working hard towards becoming the best version of yourself is important but not at the expense of your health and mental well-being. Don’t be afraid to take things slow, like I said life’s a marathon not a race.
It’s extremely important to plan for the upcoming year and set personal and professional goals to start the new year on a productive and positive note since that will set the tone for the rest of the year.
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