Year-End Checkup

We often move from one year to the next with little or no time spent reviewing the year. Consider this five-point year-end checkup:

1. Manage the narrative.
What are you telling yourself about the past year? We all tend to end the year with an often unspoken (but widely accepted) narrative. It is the headline we would put on our year. It is our responsibility to understand and own what narrative has taken hold in our mind and to manage it accordingly. So as this year closes, what narrative have you subliminally adopted? How accurate is it? Do you want to reframe any of it? Does it need to be talked about with others? What lessons can you learn from the narrative? What do you want to change?

2. Straighten the Angels.
Whether you’ve had your best year ever or the worst year imaginable, some of the people closest to you will have been impacted getting you through it. Those you love the most are your angels. Be sure to acknowledge their effort and contribution and support. You want to straighten them out and make sure they know how important they are to you and how much you appreciate them.

3. Cull.
In the course of any year there’s a whole bunch of “stuff” that accumulates in our lives and relationships which only you can unfetter. Practices that have become hinderances; routines, rituals and habits that have lost their impact or need to be refreshed; possessions that have lost their purpose or value. Make your life simpler by culling those things that truly yield no ongoing benefit.

4. Restock.
During the year you will undoubtedly have used up one or more of the staples of healthy living: energy, perhaps, or enthusiasm. Maybe you’ve lost a sense of joy, or maybe you’ve run short on your sense of purpose or mission. Take a moment and think about it. Assess your personal inventory. One way or another, you don’t want to start the new year with one or more of your staples missing from your pantry. When you’ve identified what is missing, or has run down to dangerously low levels, think through how to restock in the next 30 days.

5. Center yourself.
What about you? How have you changed this year? What do you want for yourself next year? Below are several exercises to spur and provoke your thinking as we enter the new year …

This post was inspired by a leader’s checklist from Predictable Success. I believe it applies to all roles in our life.