My 2025 Vision Board and Word of the Year Reveal
Here’s what I’m dreaming up
As you may have picked up on in the last couple of posts, I love vision boards!
Two weeks ago, I shared the mini board I created to help guide the month of January.
Last week, I shared how last year’s board helped bring my 2024 visions to life.
And finally, this week, I’m excited to unveil my 2025 vision board and the word I’ve chosen to guide my year.
2025 Themes
Community and Collaboration
While discovering and understanding introversion has been life-changing for me, I think during the pandemic years, I leaned a little too hard into hermit tendencies and the end of 2024 left me with a undeniable longing to socialize.
I want to spend more time with my creative friends—not in the pre-pandemic way that felt centered around entrepreneurship and self-help—but by exploring creativity together. I’m yearning to experiment with new mediums, explore new places, and focus more on having fun than on trying to accomplish something.
Writing and Editing
The writing journey continues! This is the year I’m hopeful to sign with a literary agent and publisher, but before that (and even after), I anticipate focusing on editing. I’m excited to flex those muscles and get my story into the best shape I can.
Additionally, I want to start dabbling in screenwriting. It’s always been my dream to write something for the screen, and now feels like the right time to start learning the craft and taking that desire seriously.
Cooking and Creativity in the Kitchen
While food, cooking, and sharing meals have always been significant parts of my life, I’m moving into a new era. I want to try challenging recipes, make sourdough bread, take fun cooking classes, and learn more about pairing wines. I want to fill my cabinets with beautiful plates and serveware and set a gorgeous tablescape.
Above all, I want to, like my mom, aunts, uncles, and grandparents, welcome someone stopping by unexpectedly and say, “Sit down, I’ll whip something up for you! You’re not hungry? It doesn’t matter, I’ll make something anyway!”
Misc: Travel, Style, and Self-Care
A little grab bag:
- Elevating my fashion aesthetic with higher-quality pieces while buying less. I’ve already re-upped my Rent the Runway membership and am trying to see how long I can go without buying any new clothes this year.
- The theater and London are two places I always want to go—I can’t imagine a year when they won’t be represented on my vision boards in some form.
- I’m still riding the high of my skincare journey in 2024 and want to keep it going this year.
- I want to keep reading books and carving out time to be cozy and indulgent.
- I want to continue practicing meditation and dabbling in stoicism to build on last year’s word, stream—as in, let’s keep everything flowing and easy.
Stars and Sparks
These are elements that will likely always have a place on my vision boards. Stars are my favorite symbol (and my most used emoji ✨)—a reminder to shine, sparkle, and look for the magic.
My 2025 Word of the Year: Clarity
The beginning of this decade has been quite wobbly, but 2024 brought the beginnings of finding my footing. This is the year I hope to truly get back on track and move forward with resolve.
One of the greatest lessons I learned in my 30s was that if you aren’t clear about what you want for yourself, everyone else will impart their wishes upon you—books, movies, shows, music, family and friends’ opinions, influencers, social media, ads. At this point, it feels like we’re living in an unending flow of suggestions.
While the idea of boundless (one of my past words of the year) possibilities is appealing, I get overwhelmed by all that noise, and it makes me stagnant.
My aim is to hone my discernment, narrow my focus, and be absolutely clear about what I want (and don’t want) to be a part of my life.
Let’s be clear
When I looked up the definition of clarity, my eyes lit up when I realized how the word also fosters my writing, storytelling, and podcasting skills:
The quality of being certain or definite.
The quality of being easy to see or hear; sharpness of image or sound.
The quality of being coherent and intelligible.
To help keep my word of the year front and center, I’ve included a few visual cues on my board, including a pair of glasses. You might notice they’re flipped, with the brand name reading backward.
Visually, the glasses looked better facing inward, and I decided this could also serve as a reminder: sometimes you need to switch your perspective to find the clarity you’re seeking.
Have you chosen a word of focus for 2025? I’m ever inspired in hearing what you’re dreaming up, and would love to hear about it in the comments.
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💭 Creative Exercises/Journal Prompts
1. Choose a word of focus for 2025.
2. Create a digital or tangible vision board and keep it somewhere you’ll see it daily.
3. Select a symbol that reminds you to honor your wishes.
☀️ Five good things
When we can recognize the things that bring us the most joy, we invite more of them into our lives. Here are five things that made me happy this week. Share yours below!
Five good things that happened this week:
1. Two new additions arrived in my kitchen to fuel my culinary adventures: a classic apron from Williams Sonoma and lovely espresso cups from Etsy.
2. I took my first tap dancing class in about 30 years, and it was so fun. I can’t wait to go back!
3. My sister and brother-in-law stayed through the week. Though they weren’t here under the best circumstances (they left Los Angeles when the fires broke out—their place is fine! 🙏), it was a gift to have this time together for chatting, movies, and special meals.
4. I experienced two Barnes and Noble visits this week: a solo trip where I worked on my book and a coffee date with my good friends Brooke and Muriel.
5. I finished Mindy Kaling’s MasterClass on TV writing and greatly enjoyed it. More on that next week. 😉
💬 Share your intention
Whether it’s a giant leap, a tiny to-do list item, a habit change, or something else, there is power in accountability, and this is a safe space to share your aim. Some weeks, we’ll fail, others we’ll soar, but with support, we’ll always keep going together.
Until next week, get out there and make something beautiful.
Michelle
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I love designating a word or mantra of the year, but I haven't locked mine down for this year! This may have been just the impetus I needed to take some time out for myself for reflection. The days are already getting away from us, aren't they?! It's mid-February already! Thank you for your always thoughtful and inspiring self-reflective content.
Amen to this: "One of the greatest lessons I learned in my 30s was that if you aren’t clear about what you want for yourself, everyone else will impart their wishes upon you."
Love your word of the year and reflections! My word for 2025 is EXTRAORDINARY. As in, how can I turn the ordinary moments into extraordinary ones? And how can I bring in extraordinary collaborators into my world, and create the most extraordinary work possible for myself? I'm tacking it on to everything I'm looking for this year -- it's been motivating so far!