It’s good to look back on the past: to see where we started, how far we’ve come, and just what we’ve come through. It’s good to take note of the ways God has blessed us, the lessons we’ve learned (or maybe haven’t yet because we haven’t paid attention yet — but should!), and the things that we’ve accomplished and/or that have been accomplished in and through us.
But I, for one, find this pretty overwhelming to do “from scratch.” What do I look at? How do I remember? What do I ask myself? So I’ve pulled together some lists that various others have been using for a while to review their years. Use any of these lists as-is if they happen to work for you. Or just look them over as inspiration and a starting point for your own list. (That’s what I’ll be doing.)
1. David Allen’s Questions for Completing and Beginning the Year
You may know David Allen as the productivity guru who wrote Getting Things Done. I love that book; it had a couple concepts in it that radically changed the way I work (for the better). Allen shared his questions for completing and beginning the year here and, as you can imagine, it emphasizes accomplishments and productivity.
2. Doug Phillips’ How to End the Year
I know I might take some flak for including this one, given the recent events surrounding Doug Phillips. I first received this list in an email from him & Vision Forum many years ago, and I still think it’s an excellent list. I’m not one to throw out the baby with the bath water, and I believe that whatever the man’s shortcomings (we are all human, after all), that doesn’t make the truth less true or make a good thing inherently bad. So here you have Doug Phillips’ How to End the Year, which I appreciate for its focus on what God has done in our lives.
3. Justyn (Creative Christian Mama)’s Annual Reevaluation
This one comes from a friend and fellow blogger. The emphasis of Justyn’s family’s annual reevaluation is taking stock of where they are, and how that relates to where they’d like to be. It’s a little like orienting oneself on a map before continuing on a journey.
4. MindValley’s 3 Most Important Questions to Ask Yourself
MindValley is not going to be everyone’s favorite, either. MindValley does a lot of energy healing and related things, and it may or may not all be what I would consider valid and acceptable. (I’m definitely not saying I’d recommend the whole site, blindly.) However, I found the “3 most important questions” very insightful. They’re the kind of questions that dig down to the heart of things rather than hovering on the surface where we often tend to stay.
They’re not meant to be an annual thing, specifically, but if you’ve never asked them of yourself before, this turning of the year is as good a time as any!
5. Dee & Sarah’s 50 Annual Questions to Ask Your Spouse
This one’s a little different! The questions you’ll find here are this couple’s way of keeping a finger on the pulse of their relationship. This seems like a wonderful step toward keeping the little things from tearing your relationship up because they’re so small you don’t notice them — until they aren’t.
6. Secrets of Her Success Year-in-Review Questions
These “questions” are actually reflective sentence starters, and they come from a site for business owners. It’s not specifically a Christian list, but it covers a pretty broad spectrum, and I like that it’s both thorough and simple. The “questions” aren’t complicated, but they are open-ended, so you can be as brief or as deeply reflective as you like.
BONUS: The Method You Use to Plan Ahead
I wanted to point out one last option: the method you use to plan ahead for the year is also useful for reflecting on the year as you finish it. If you choose “one word” for the year, you can look back on how that word was reflected in your year. If you made a list of goals, you can ask yourself which ones you completed, which ones you made good progress on, which things to carry forward (or not), and where you were maybe not thinking very realistically when you set them. (I have a tendency, myself, not to set goals that are individually unrealistic, but to set too many that require a lot all at once, so it’s impossible to really focus on all of them.) If you made a bucket list, did you check any of those items off? Hopefully you get the idea.
Whatever method you use, don’t forget to make note of the blessings God has placed in your life. If you’re here, reading this, that’s at least one thing — however easy or however hard this year has been, He brought you through.
Blessings to you as you close out 2014 and look ahead to 2015 with a fresh, clean start.
“Here I raise mine ebenezer*; hither by Thy help I’m come.”
*stone of remembrance
[…] Especially if you’re doing this at the start of a year, it can be a good first step to look back over the past year and assess. What happened? What were the blessings in it? The struggles? What did you get […]