Hey friend,

I’m a big fan of picking a word or theme for the year.

I’ve been doing annual reflections and plans for the last 14 years. As part of that process, I pick a one word or theme to act as the north star for year.

This year, I had a lot of one-word theme contenders for 2025!

After brainstorming 20+ words. Then narrowing it down to two. I’ve finally settled on my word for 2025.

Create.

The hidden power of choosing a one-word theme for the year

Picking a word of the year gives you clarity, purpose and priority for the year ahead.

Ideally it’s a multi-layered word that can serve as a compass for various aspects of your life—family, work, business, hobbies etc.

The word acts as a quick shortcut to remind you of the direction you’ve set for yourself for the year.

You can pick your word any time of the year, but the new year is an ideal time because of the “Fresh Start” effect.

In psychology and behavioural science research, a fresh start (like the start of a new year or month, or moving to a new city) gives us an extra boost of motivation and productivity to tackle our goals and make progress towards our dreams.

Why?

Because it interrupts the continuity of time and puts distance between our present and our past-selves, disappointments and failures.

This then allows us to set new intentions and re-frame our future.

This “Fresh Start” effect is the reason why people feel energised to set new year resolutions and ambitious goal at the start of the year.

So don’t miss this opportunity to leverage your own natural human psychology and design your best year yet.

And if you’re still stuck on what word to pick, watch this 4 minute video. I think you’ll find it helpful!

A quick recap of 2024

Last year, the word I chose was entrepreneurship.

Because I went all in on building an online business (which turned out to be Notion consulting). It also gave my family and I the flexibility and freedom to prioritise relationships and more travel in 2024.

I want to take a few minutes to share some of my reflections on 2024 (and encourage you to do the same, if you haven’t already).

There were so many highs and low in both my personal and business life.

The lows were some of the most challenging times I’ve experienced in my life. But they also helped me grow mentally stronger and strengthened some of my closest relationships.

Here are a few of my 2024 wins and losses:

The wins

• Created and launched version one of my Notion Consulting website. 

  Now I have a digital home to direct people to when they want to find out how I can help them use Notion to eliminate overwhelm, boost their productivity and organise their life and business.

• Created and launched Clutter to Clarity in Notion Roadmap, a free 5-day email course to help people simplify and streamline their Notion setup. 

  98 people have taken the course and decluttered their Notion so far. It’s been great to receive email replies like this “My Notion was so cluttered that I hated opening Notion. Following the day 1 steps, I moved everything into the Archives page and got an immediate clean up. So that made me a fan right away.”

• Read 45 books. 

  My goal for 2024 was to read 20 books. Some of these books were tremendously helpful in my journey of building a Notion consulting service.

• 2024 was a huge year for travel. 

  I was on the road for 116 days, explored over 30 cities and destinations, and even went on 5 trips with friends or extended family.

• Hosted the first ever Notion in Houston event. 

  It was so refreshing to meet other Notioneers in-person, showcase how I use Notion and help answer questions on the build-challenges they faced in Notion.

The losses

• I grew this newsletter to 315 readers, falling well short of my ambitious goal of 2000 newsletter subscribers. 

  To be honest, I abandon the numbers game early on in the year when I pivoted from digital products to working 1-on-1 with clients. My goal shifted to simply being helpful to a list of engaged readers (some even turned into clients in 2024). As marketer and content strategist Josh Spector loves to says, it’s about readers, not subscribers.

• I didn’t hit my revenue target for my Notion consulting business in 2024. 

  The revenue target was probably a bit too ambitious to start with. I also experimented a bit too much, which meant a lack of focus towards revenue-generating activities.

• I didn’t kick off my passion project of starting a travel and photography newsletter. 

  As the year unfolded, it quickly became obvious that adding this to my plate would lead to work overload (and I wouldn’t be practicing Slow Productivity!)

Why I’ve picked the word “Create” for 2025

Create is the shortcut to my 2025 theme create, don’t procrastinate or perfect.

Running your own business gives you flexibility and control over how you spend your time. But that’s only a benefit if you design your days and weeks with intention and focus.

While I think I was pretty disciplined and intentional with how I spent my time in 2024, there’s still room for improvement.

Specifically, I want to:

• Kick perfectionism to the curb.

• Reduce fear-induced procrastination.

• Cut back on knowledge consumption and up the action.

So this year, I’m honing in on creation.

• Create even when I’m feeling doubt.

• Create to make progress not pursue perfection.

• Create and hit publish even when it’s only 80% done.

• Create when I know enough, not when I feel I know everything inside out.

I use Notion to track my word of the year, vision statement, reflections and annual plans, all in one place. Notion helps me stay organised with minimal effort.

This year I even decided to revamp my Annual Review and Planning template by including a Wheel of Life assessment (leveraging the Notion Charts feature), updating the reflection questions and streamlining my goal setting process further.

Here’s how I see “create” shaping my year

It’s about infusing the mindset of creating in every aspect of life—relationships, fun, business, hobbies etc.

Business:

I’m excited to continue to work with 1-one-1 with clients eliminate digital clutter, organise their life and business in Notion, boost their productivity, and create their dream Notion setup that makes work faster and easier.

(Btw, if that sounds attractive to you? Let’s have a chat)

Travel:

Travel has broadened my world view, helped me grow as a person in so many ways, and has been a great way to create memorable experiences with family and friends.

I’m excited to create more travel and photo memories this year. Maybe even kick start that travel and photography newsletter idea of mine 😉

Relationships:

Maintaining and building relationships takes time and effort. I’m proud of how I intentionally created time and space to build new relationships while also maintaining important existing family and friend relationships in 2024.

This year it’s about continuing to double down on that.

Community and collaboration:

Over the last 2+ years building a business online, one of my favourite things has been connecting with like-minded people. Most are from different parts of the world—Canada, Australia, US, Germany etc.)

Whether it was a regular catch up call, a discovery call to see if I’m a good fit to help them with their Notion problems, or a call to collaborate on a newsletter or project, each interaction has been insightful and influenced my business in some way.

In 2025, I want to create and collaborate more.

That’s it for today!

Here’s to a year of joy and growth for all of us.

How is your year shaping up? Do you have a one-word theme for 2025?—I’d love to hear from you!

See you next week,

Janice CK

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