New year resolutions are passe. Vision boards and manifesting are now catching on in India

Vision boards trended in the week leading up to New Year, with workshops and participants from India on the rise.

In the week leading up to the New Year, Google searches on ideas on vision boards, image searches on Pinterest, and reels on how to create a manifested version of 2025, peaked on the internet. But this is not necessarily surprising especially because celebrities like Dua Lipa and Simone Biles have spoken of the idea of ‘manifesting’ a future. Its popularity even prompted the Cambridge Dictionary to coin it the ‘word of the year’ in 2024.

What is interesting to note however, is the rise in workshops and participants from India. People from across the country are armed with stickers and images of motivating phrases, praying for concert tickets, financial success and peace this year.

Vision boards — a physical or digital smorgasbord of images and phrases that showcase one’s goals, priorities and ambitions — have been the talk of the town in the weeks leading up to the New Year. The basic idea is to set clear intentions, vision and ambitions and represent them visually on the board. It can be about hobbies, studies, career, even relationships and mental health.

Harshitha Parthasarathi, a 29-year-old photographer based in Chennai, is already on her fourth vision board. She began making them in March 2024 after her friend introduced her to the concept. Harshitha says they seem to have had a magical effect on her life, describing how her wish to save money for travel was realised after she put it up on her vision board.

As curiosity seems to have grown around vision boards with reels of similar success stories taking over Instagram, many artists have begun conducting workshops on the construction of vision boards.

Around 10 people attended Bhanu Vivekanadan’s first workshop on December 29 at Ikigai in Chennai. When asked about how the workshop went, she says, “It was a fun evening getting to know each other, chit chatting while making the boards,” she says, adding that people aged 16 to 52 attended the event. She is planning to hold another on January 12.

People also set up vision board dates with friends, with some even preferring to stay-in on New Year eve “manifesting” their future.