Annual Affirmation: Alchemy
This is monthly affirmations, a newsletter from founder Sonya Yu. Each month, she imparts a saying to incorporate into daily life to live in attunement with your most authentic self.
Before every new year, there's an exercise I like to practice.
I started it five years ago, when I realized resolutions only set me up for failure — these big lofty ideas we get excited about abstractly but don't actually carve out time or space in our lives to execute. (Because I’m Chinese, we’re considering the New Year in alignment with the Lunar New Year calendar, not the Western Gregorian one ;)
Each year, I think about the theme I want to put into the forefront of my mind and manifest. Last year, my theme was high-quality. Whatever I pursued, I wanted it to be substantive and superlative. As a result, I manifested high-quality experiences and projects, relationships with creatives and strategists who became my business partners. The flip side of this was high-quality problems. I needed to learn to navigate complexity and conflict with grace and diplomacy.
I prefer themes over resolutions because they serve as a north star, guiding your body and consciousness to take micro-actions that help you reach your intended destination or state of being.
For 2024, my theme is alchemy. By definition it's a medieval practice that transforms matter. Base metal into gold. Water into a universal elixir. That kind of thing. But for my life, I interpret alchemy as transforming something that's seemingly negative or tough into a self-empowering exercise or practice. It's a reframing that teaches me to not give away my power.
I make a habit of writing down my theme because it helps plant the word into my consciousness. That way I can better manifest alchemy by identifying and integrating instances where either people are being exemplars of alchemy or situations where I can practice it.
Here's my process to discover your own theme:
Write down micro goals - I consider everything I want to accomplish this year and write it down. I focus on what actually feels additive to my life, circle those, and find the macro through line that connects everything together. If, for example, your micro goals are to call your mom or go to therapy weekly, perhaps you’re intentionally cultivating relationships with your family and yourself — so your word might be intention. Writing it down helps bring it into your conscious mind.
Put the theme front and center - I write my word on a post-it note and stick it on my desk computer. It helps put the theme at the forefront of my perception filter and becomes a compass for decisions or forks in the road I'll encounter this year. Because it’s top of mind, I’m better able to choose whether to alchemize a bad experience into a teaching moment or a reason to berate myself. It helps manifest my words and thoughts with actions in a more conscious way.
Check in frequently - I have monthly reflections with myself. I ask myself: How am I embodying alchemy? When did I notice someone else performing alchemy? What were the missed opportunities for me to perform alchemy? Because my calendar is my past, present and future, I can flip through that for a daily journal of data, allowing me to answer those questions. Maybe your calendar is your data set or maybe you spend 15 minutes reflecting on your day in Google notes. Find your way to track your days so you can reflect on how you’re integrating the word into your life.
At the end of the day, the exercise is designed to get you connected with your deepest desires and wishes so you can realize them during this next turn around the sun. It's magic because when you truly know yourself and your desires, to steal this line from The Alchemist by Paulo Coelho: "All the universe conspires in helping you to achieve it.”
Here's to your manifestation,
XO S