Kakizome: Japanese way of new-years resolution

"元旦开笔"[1] The first writing of the New Year. Its a small ritual performed by ancient Chinese intellectuals on the first day of the New Year. It has a history of about 1,000 years. During the Qing Dynasty, the emperor's ceremony became more grand and lengthy, including writing words of blessing with ornate Chinese brushes, symbolically turning the pages of the New Year's calendar (in the early Qing Dynasty, European missionaries participated in the improvement of the traditional Chinese calendar) [2] and drinking from a golden cup symbolizing the eternal and unbreakable borders. Ironically, one of the golden cups was stolen by French invaders during the Second Opium War [3].

[1] https://imagepphcloud.thepaper.cn/pph/image/114/965/140.jpg [2] https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Johann_Adam_Schall_von_Bell [3] https://wallacelive.wallacecollection.org/eMP/eMuseumPlus?se...

Few more fun facts:

Elementary school students all write kakizome at the end of December. Within the school, each grade will write the exact same thing. They're hung in the halls for all to see. Hundreds of the exact same kakizome.

Many people burn their kakizome mid-January during "Dondoyaki."

The posture, attention and care taken while writing Kakizome is one of the important points. Those, and the outcome of the characters themselves, are all taken into account.

Unrelated, but Japan's officaily chosen Kanji for the year 2024 was "金" which means gold, or money, or heck, even Friday.

Last year even though I didn’t have a theme, I made small changes in the way I live, tried to complete my 15 book goodreads challenge, started doing sports and improve myself professionally on my free time.

This year started with pretty fundamental questions in the way I live and uncertainties about my future so deciding on a theme is very difficult. I can’t answer those questions and don’t know what I really want. I will try to put an effort into keeping the good habits I gained last year though.

Careful with this. I once did a kakizome for 水 (mizu, water), because it's a nice simple character to draw. That year the bathroom leaked, flooding the house.

I saw someone on mastodon[0] mentioning the idea of using a bingo card for new year resolutions rather than a specific objective.

It aligns with the idea of having a new year theme rather than a specific goal, and I liked the idea. Sadly, I'm not one for resolutions either way.

[0] https://mastodon.social/@jessie/113742080312737907

This is awesome.

I'm going with 多角経営 (takaku keiei) A four-character phrase (yojijukugo) literally translating to “managing multiple facets.” It carries a similar notion to “Portfolio Approach,” implying strategic diversification rather than a lack of focus.

The Chinese have a new-year’s calligraphy tradition, too, written on red paper and hung on your door. Of course, that’s done on the Lunar new year, not the Solar one.

Your description of New Year’s as “like Western Christmas” is apt - I remember visiting one year, shocked by how quiet everything was, and how many restaurants and attractions were closed. Everyone was at home with their family! The January First festival at Senso-ji Temple was a unique spectacle, though - the sound of people donating hundreds of one-yen coins at once is really unique.

That’s interesting, thanks for sharing!

I usually take the opposite approach. My resolutions are usually a lot smaller, and their theme more practical. I don’t intend to stick with them all year, but I fully intend to make significant progress within a month, and thus set the course for the year.

Some examples from this year: improve my German, cook Indian food, travel with friends. For each of them I have already made a list of actionable first steps, and I have taken many of those steps.

I find a general theme to be both too broad and too narrow. I want many small things, not one big thing.

Fun fact: although rarely used, the very close word "kakiazomai" (κακιάζομαι) means "I am feeling/generating evil/bad/negative thoughts" in Greek.

If nothing else, the fact that many people write anything with ink and brush helps to sustain the calligraphy culture. Nowadays, to many (if not most) of them the new year kakizome ritual is the only occasion they practice brush calligraphy in an entire year.

This is my second year picking a theme and I picked "Revolution", many things are (probably) going to be different 360 days from now for me!

Fun read, it didn't occur to me that I could simply pick foreign words that are much more adept at explaining complex concepts briefly.

I just spent the new year in Japan in a temple, and the way they do it compared to my country makes much more sense. They just wait until midnight to hear the bell 108 times, go to the temple pray and then wake up to see first sunrise, instead of watching the fireworks and partying all night.