How to plan 2027 on paper: a method in four evenings

Planning your year isn't filling in a list of resolutions you've forgotten by February. It's deciding where you want to turn your gaze and setting up something that reminds you of it every week. This method fits into four quiet December evenings.

Evening 1 · Closing 2026

Before asking anything of 2027, look at what 2026 has given you. Write two columns:

• Lights: what went well, what inspired you, who you met.
• Shadows: what was hard, what drained you, what you don't want to repeat.

Finish with one sentence: "From 2026 I'm taking…".

Evening 2 · Eight areas, few intentions

Divide your life into eight areas: love; health and wellbeing; money and abundance; work and career; family; friendships; personal and spiritual growth; leisure, rest and fun.

In each one, write three to five intentions, no more. Write them in the present tense and in the positive: "I walk every morning" instead of "I have to exercise more".

Then mark the three most important of the year. If everything is a priority, nothing is.

Evening 3 · From the year to the month

Take your three priorities and ask yourself what small step you can take each month. Write it on the first page of each month.

Also choose three to eight habits for January: the ones that hold up your intentions (sleep, movement, writing, reading). You'll tick them off every day; in February you can change them.

Evening 4 · The week and the rhythm

Decide on your planning moment: ten minutes on Sunday afternoon. For the week: appointments, deadlines and a single priority per day.

And choose a rhythm for reviewing: the simplest is the moon. At the new moon, one intention for the cycle; at the full moon, a look at what has grown. Twelve or thirteen reviews a year, without waiting for December.

What you don't need

• A perfect system or twelve colours.
• To write every day: two lines on most days is enough.
• To start on 1 January. The year begins when you begin.

This is, in fact, the order I followed when designing Anahata Sunrise 2027: first the year, then the month, the week and the day.