Ep. 29: A Better Way to Set Intentions for the New Year
New Year, new rituals. In this solo episode, I’m sharing the end-of-year practice that’s completely changed how I see success, growth, and who I’m becoming.
In this episode of The Pivot Point, I’m pulling back the curtain on my personal New Year ritual, one that has nothing to do with rigid resolutions and everything to do with identity, alignment, and self-trust. If traditional New Year’s goals leave you feeling pressured, behind, or disconnected, this episode offers a gentler but far more powerful approach.
I walk through how I shifted from goal-obsessed resolutions to choosing a word (or phrase) of the year, an intention rooted in who I’m becoming rather than what I’m chasing. I share how tracking aligned actions with simple Post-its helped me stop minimizing my wins, celebrate growth in real time, and break the habit of constantly moving the goalposts.
We also talk about reflection as a leadership tool—how this practice supported me during my corporate years, strengthened my performance reviews, and built confidence grounded in evidence, not imposter syndrome. From weekly career check-ins to year-end reflection rituals, this episode is about honoring progress without needing permission.
If you’re entering a new year craving clarity, self-compassion, and momentum that actually feels sustainable, this episode will meet you right where you are.
What You’ll Hear
✔️Why I stopped doing traditional New Year’s resolutions
✔️How choosing a word of the year shifts your identity, not just behavior
✔️The Post-it practice that helped me actually see my growth
✔️Why high achievers struggle to celebrate wins—and how to change that
✔️How this ritual supported my career growth (and performance reviews)
✔️A powerful new question-based approach to intention setting
“Every aligned action is a vote for the person you’re becoming.”
If this practice resonated, share this episode with someone who’s craving a more intentional way to start the year.
Grab your free Heart-Aligned Career Transition Starter at https://www.leadintact.com/freebies/heart-aligned-career or Book 20-min consultation call https://leadintactwithlaura.as.me/free-consultation
Proceed as if success is inevitable—because that’s how it becomes inevitable.
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You are listening to the pivot point where we unpack the defining moments that shift careers and lives. I'm your host, Laura Dionisio, a founder of Lead Intact , and my mission is to spotlight the raw real stories behind career pivots, the fears, the hopes. The messy middles and the bold decisions that follow if you're feeling stuck or quietly wondering what's next?
I hope these stories help you see yourself a little more clearly and inspire you to start moving toward your own dream life. Let's begin.
New Year new me. Are you in the camp where you are pro New Year's resolution or are you against it because like my boyfriend, you think it's waste of time and you're like, well, you can do it any day of the year. Why does the first have to be special? Well, [00:01:00] I am in the camp of the former, I have a specific ritual that I do every December 31st, which I'm gonna share with you in this episode.
I love it. It makes me really happy. And, yes, while you can make changes. Whenever you want. Really. I just feel that because it has become a ritual at this point for me, for many years. it becomes something extra special. So hopefully if you are in the same camp as my boyfriend and you're like, anti new Year's Resolution, stay with me.
So.
Here's how I view New Year's resolution. I used to be the person that made it very goal oriented. So think like, oh, this year I'm gonna lose 10 pounds, or, this year I'm going to get a new job.
Or, this is the year I am going to start dating again, or I'm gonna move to Paris and eat baguettes every day. That used to be how I viewed New Year's resolutions. I have since [00:02:00] changed it to be more about who am I becoming this year. So at the time of this recording in 2026, who am I becoming?
And so my ritual is all related to that. So two things that I do.
One, I choose a word of the year. Like an intention, so to speak, of who I'm looking to become. it could be a phrase as well, a few times. I have made it, a phrase rather than a word if it's fitting. So for example, in 2025, my word of the year was fierce.
And I don't just mean fierce, like this red leather jacket that I'm wearing, although that could be it as well. But I mean fierce in terms of showing up unapologetically as myself, being really fierce about saying yes to my desires, about going after what I want even resting.
About taking care of my own needs, about self-love. And so I had that word of the year in 2025 as kind of like a guidance of [00:03:00] specifically what aspects of me that I wanted to evolve. The other thing I do is write it in a post-it and put it on my mirror because I know quite a few people who do the same thing.
Like they do a word of the year, but then by the time we get together and I ask, what's your word of the year, typically, they're like, oh, I can't remember. And so for me it's very important to remember. 'cause then it's kind of like, what is the point of having a word of the year if you're not keeping track of it and not celebrating at the end of the year.
But then again, I am a metrics person. This is gonna be metrics oriented if you, didn't catch onto that.
But what I then do is throughout the year, right, so I have a post-it with my word of the year. So 2025, it was fierce. And what happens is any time I do something. That is aligned to the identity of the version of Laura who is fierce.
I write it down in a small post-it and I date it, and then I stick it to my mirror and I'm talking [00:04:00] about my mirror, like my floor length mirror. So full length mirror. And what's cool about that is that it's very satisfying to look at my mirror as time goes by and see the number of post-Its that fill it.
And I really started this practice, this Post-it practice, not because I'm obsessed with Post-Its I, I am now, but just because I am the kind of person, and if you are a high performer, high achiever, you are probably this way too. I have tended to take my achievements, my successes for granted, and I was the kind of person who kept moving the goalposts forward so that.
I never really felt like I was winning ever, because once I accomplished something, like, let's say even my move from California to New York, my move from upstate New York to New York City, like I would take maybe five seconds to celebrate it and then I'd move on in my life. And so a few years back I realized, I don't like [00:05:00] this about myself.
I was finding that my sense of self-worth was suffering a bit because I never took a moment to be gratitude for myself or proud of the things that I had done or really acknowledged my growth other than like maybe an entry in my journal or something. So it started off as like me having a visual, tangible way to view all of my accomplishments.
So it used to be an accomplishment based. Practice. it pertained mostly to my weightlifting numbers, because that was where I could see that I was being so hard on myself. just to give you an example, these are made up numbers.
There's this lift called clean and jerk, Let's say. my PR at the time, was like, 145 pounds and I was able to do 125 pounds in training for three reps consistently. But let's say one week, one 20 pounds felt [00:06:00] really heavy. I would be so, hard on myself for that one 20.
That's all my mind can focus on. And it didn't matter if like two days prior to that I hit. 1 35 pound for two instead of for one. I was always focused on my failures and things I can do better. And for a long time I thought that was the way to go. I'm like, oh, but that's what's driving me to be better is because I'm never satisfied.
Right? I guess. But it didn't feel good, and so a few years ago I decided that because I'm a very visual person and because I also like to gamify things. I want to not only celebrate these little wins, but I also want it to be kind of like a game. Like, ooh, how fun does it get to be? And so since then I have morphed that to not just accomplishments, but specifically like aligned actions towards whatever your word or phrase of the [00:07:00] year is.
Right. So for example, in 2025, let me see if I can remember some of the things. Oh, like fierce, right? me leaving corporate. me putting my notice in me being honest with myself, like these are things that I would write. It doesn't have to be like anything big. That's not the point. The point is, isI heard this in an interview with, I believe it was James Clear, is he the author of Atomic Habits?
But he said something like, anytime you do an action that's aligned to who you wanna be, it's like you're handing in votes. To the person that you're becoming. And so I see it that way now so that by the end of the year, it's almost like I see all these votes to me becoming more fierce.
Right? Or whatever the word or phrase of the year is. So, That's step one. So it's not too late to start, right? Like if you're listening to this at the time that this is released, which is in January, it doesn't matter when you start, when I first started, it was probably like, August, September.
it [00:08:00] doesn't matter when you start, but if this practice resonates with you. Go ahead and reflect on what your word of the year is gonna be, even if you only have one or two months left in 2026 or whatever year you're listening to. And really what I found is that because I've been doing this practice for years now, my mind is now more attuned to the ways in which I am winning.
Versus the times in which I am failing. So now anytime I'm like, oh yeah, like San Antonio 25, that was like a fierce action. I'm like, oh, don't forget to write it on a post-it. It's just really exciting to visually see it's almost like you're seeing your growth because of the number of post-its around your mirror, or maybe you have like a wall somewhere.
The other thing I do Now is every December 31st, I take all of those post-its down and [00:09:00] I, because I'm me, I put it in numerical order, meaning January, is at the top and then December is at the bottom, and I go through each of them.
Yeah, one by one. And I take a moment to let the memories come back to me, to let myself feel, to let myself remember. And it is such a beautiful experience because I don't know about you, but I tend to forget things that have happened, you know, it was really cool to watch my own growth and to remember all the things that have happened in the year, the good times, the bad, the hard, the things that felt easy, that kind of thing.
And by the way, since this is a career related podcast, this is super important to do as well from a work standpoint. So I'm gonna take a pause with regards to like my New Year's ritual. This is what I started doing also a few years ago when I was still working in [00:10:00] corporate.
I had a standing meeting with myself every Friday. For an hour and I just called it career block. And part of the things that I did during my career block is that I would look at the week and I would write down the accomplishments, and I would put detail, what was it? It's not just like, oh, I feel good 'cause I finished this project.
I wrote down the project exactly what I did, who I talked to, et cetera. Why is this important? Because this is also the time of year where it's performance review. And it's really helpful because again, I don't know about you, but before I started doing this in my performance review, I could only speak to like the past two months, maybe three months, like looking through my notes. Well, if you've been collecting data basically like every week and all the things that you've done and specifically highlighting things like, oh, include also like any awards you've gotten.
If you have thank yous from other teammates, put it in a folder. That's something you can [00:11:00] reference as well. That's good to reference if you're looking to have like a raise or promotion. But anyway, okay. So. I totally got sidetracked, but that's okay because I feel like it was pertinent.
Okay, back to the ritual. All right, so I take a moment, several moments and read through all the post-its.
And then the other thing I do is every December 31st I write a letter to the following year. So like. In December 31st, 2024, I wrote a letter for December 31st, 2025, me. And then on December 31st of that year, I read that letter, maybe cry a little bit, and then I write a letter for the following year.
And then I also put that on the mirror because otherwise I'd probably lose it. In the letter, I usually write like what my word of the year is for that year, what I've done. And then I write like, my hope for you is, and then I write down the things that I wish for [00:12:00] future me, right?
for me at least, like I tend to forget what I write almost immediately. So it is always a surprise to me what I've written from the year before. And hence the. possible tears. Well, maybe that's just me. it was really cool because some of the things I wrote in there was something like I hope at this point you are leaning fully into your business and that you've left corporate.
And if you are in corporate, I hope you're doing something that you love. And you know what's crazy? And this is the thing, I guess I tend to be more honest when I'm writing these letters. My decision to leave corporate like consciously when I was just like all in, I'm doing This wasn't until like August of 2025, I met up with a friend in May and she had told me May of that year that I had said it, but I completely forgot about it, and now I have this letter telling me that December.
Of 2024. I was thinking of leaving corporate. So it's just really cool and, [00:13:00] that's where it brought literal tears to my eyes because I'm like, wow. 2024. Laura had such hopes and like love and faith in 2025, Laura, and it was cool that like a lot of the things that I said, had actually happened.
So that is my New Year's ritual. I guess it's technically end of the year ritual because it's in preparation of the new year.
The other thing that I started to add starting this year, because a friend of mine had mentioned it, and again, it's all related to identity, is rather than having like a goal per se, 'cause let's, let's face it, even like the word or phrase of the year, it's still.
A goal, right? It's something that you're walking towards, which personally I think is really important. But my friend had suggested that what if it's like a question that you ask yourself, the example that they had given because. The other person was said something like, well, what happens if you don't know the answer by the time it's the end of the year?
And the person [00:14:00] who suggested this practice said, it's not so much about answering the question. So the question isn't something like, will I get a new job? You know, or What is my calling? It's more about who you are as a person. So the example that was given is. Their question for that year is, how can I be more open?
Right? So think about that. If, your goal is a career that you feel that passion again, then maybe your word of the year is something like confidence, or maybe it is something like open, or it could be something like. dream, right? Because that talks about the person you need to become in order to have the career that you want.
And then maybe your question is something like, how can I be more curious? Or how can I see myself differently? How can I shift my perspective? So. Anyway, I just wanted to share that.
I know this is a little bit different than my usual episodes, [00:15:00] but I figured it'd be worthwhile to share what my practice is because it really, I mean, I call it end of the year practice or New Year's practice, but honestly I do it throughout the year.
hope that helps. And remember, I have the mug this time. If you're watching this on YouTube, remember to proceed as if success. Is inevitable because that's how it becomes inevitable. All right. Take care.
All right, friend. That's it for today's drop. If this episode hits something deep, don't just sit with it, act on it. Share this with a friend who needs to hear it, and then head to www.leadinta.com to grab your free heart aligned career transition starter, or book a free 20 minute call with me. I'm here when you're ready to stop feeling stuck and start moving toward what you really want.
Catch you next time.