AFTER our joyful revelling comes the inevitable season of good intentions. When we make our New Year’s resolutions, we often set ourselves ambitious goals – to run a half-marathon, learn a language or write a novel. One reason these resolutions often fail is that our focus is too wide – we think about the reward at the end of the journey, not considering the little steps that we need to take to get there. Then we end up feeling defeated and dejected as we fail to make the progress we want.

Perhaps we should all try to apply the Japanese concept of…