This blog post is kind of personal. You have been warned! 🙂
For the last 6 years or more, we are performing this New Years “family exercise”. We call it “dream maps”. It is not our idea, but I can’t recall neither the origins nor its original name. I guess it was my wife who learned about it and persuaded us to give it a try. We liked it so much, we are doing it every year now.
It definitely works for us, so maybe it will work for you as well. Curious? Read on, please.
Moja lepsza połowa opisała ten pomysł lata temu tutaj. 🙂
Just Do It
The idea is very simple. Take a big sheet of paper (A2 recommended), a lot of color felt-tip pens and draw everything you dream of that will happen to you next year.
So every year we put these big sheets of paper on the floor and we all (we are a 2+3 family) get busy. We start with with writing our name and the year in the very center of the blank page and then… well, each one of us tries to put their dreams (and/or goals) to the paper. After all is finished we tell others about what we have just drawn and add some explanation. And we cheer a lot, hoping all of our dreams will come true (and planning how could we achieve them).
Reminders
And in the summer we get together to have a look at the pictures so that we remember what it was, that we were hoping for (and we figure out how to make it happen).
And the next year, we start the session with the review of the last year’s drawings to see how many of our dreams have actually happened.
P.S. Some of us put their posters on a wall so they can get inspired the whole year round.
What I Enjoy About It
- It is one of these uniting we-do-it-together things.
- It works for big and small.
- It is a very nice way to reveal your dreams and hopes, and present it to your family (as much as you want).
- Surprisingly (or not?) many of our dreams come true which feels really nice.
- It is nice to see how our dreams evolve over time. There are some recurring patterns (“good health”, “holidays in some nice place” or “more time with family & friends”) but every year we can see how we develop. It happens not only for the kids (when they are small you can drawing of ice creams and such) but for us, adults, as well. Interestingly, after the long work-from-home period of covid-stricken 2020, neither me nor my second half put “more time with my spouse” on the list of dreams – apparently we spent even too much time together recently! 🙂
Few Tips
- with small kids you will probably need to add some text to their drawing (use pencil) so that you know next year what they meant by their drawing,
- believe in yourself – yes, you really draw good enough (oh, come on, it is not that hard!),
- you can draw or cut pictures from paper magazines,
- the whole event can take up to 1 hour, maybe even more.
Happy New 2021 Year to you!
P.S. Do something for your kids in 2021 – join Extinction Rebellion or other climate movement and fight for your planet.