Resonance – my theme for 2025
I like the idea of a year having a personal theme; it's more flexible than just goals and broad enough that it has the potential to exert influence in a number of areas and in ways that are serendipitous. I think I got the idea from Fernando Gros (who just published his theme for 2025), and I've privately, tentatively, set myself themes at the beginning of previous years that I soon forgot about. For the first time, I'm doing it publicly.
My theme for the new year is resonance.
I use the definition of the social theorist Hartmut Rosa, as explained by Oliver Burkeman in Meditations for Mortals:
The more we try to render the world controllable, the more it eludes us; and the more daily life loses what Rosa calls its resonance, its capacity to touch, move and absorb us.
Resonance means:
What brings fulfilment is being in a certain form of reciprocal relationship with the rest of the world, including other people; you might liken it to a dance in which you alternatingly lead and follow. Whereas a relationship in with you unquestionably have the upper hand at all times is no relationship at all.
It's central to an enjoyable and meaningful life that whenever we reach out to the world in this way, we don't get to control how it responds. The value and depth of the experience relies on that unknowability.
This resonates (ha!) with me for various reasons. I seem to oscillate between two states, where I either want to exert a maximal amount of control, where I log all my calories, excessively fill out my habit tracker and do all sorts of other things to be more "productive" – and the opposite, where I avoid thinking about being in control at all and just do whatever my impulses dictate me to do.
Both states share, opposed to each other as they may be, that I'm not very engaged with the world in a good way. My relationship with the world lacks, in Rosas terms, resonance. I would like to find a healthy middle way for most of the time.
Letting life in
There is another, related, area where I hope the yearly theme will be helpful to me: Procrastination and avoidance. I often tend to shy adversity and take the path of least resistance. I might stay home and play video games over taking the chance to meet new people. I might not admit that I disagree with a statement because I fear pushback or awkwardness. I might not start a ambitious project because I fear I could fail and embarrass myself.
In all these (of course completely made up!) examples I chose comfort over the chance of something interesting happening, over the potential for growth – over the possibility for resonance. Of course, this is also a way to assert control and minimise risk. The theme should remind me to be less timid, more bold, and give life a chance to "touch, move and absorb" me.