Gather
Insights and learnings
Name the three things this year taught you, in order of impact. Each one marks ground you now stand on.
What do I know now that I did not know in January?
BeGenerative
Complete the Year
Gather what this year taught you and set your course for the next
A short, reflective exercise that gathers the year into three insights, three accomplishments and three commitments, then brings them back to you through the year so they stay present.
Insights Accomplishments Commitments
The practice
Close the year with intent
One of the most powerful things we can do to shape our future is to get clear on what has worked and define what we want next.
The end of the year offers a natural pause. A short written review gathers your thinking about progress, completion and direction, so you can decide what to carry forward, what to release and what to give more of.
It also lets you create the coming year on purpose. The exercise is brief, and the insight it surfaces stays with you well beyond the first week of January.
The ability to shift from reacting against the past to leaning into and presencing an emerging future is probably the single most important leadership capacity today.
Three reflections
Nine lines that carry the year
Each reflection asks for three lines. Writing them down gives your thinking a form you can return to.
Acknowledge
Accomplishments
Acknowledge three things you created, started or completed. Gratitude for what you have built consolidates it and shows the distance travelled.
What am I glad I did?
Choose
Commitments
Choose three commitments for the year ahead: what you will carry forward and what you will do more of. Written commitments turn intention into direction.
What will I give my attention to first?
Every great work, every big accomplishment, has been brought into manifestation through holding to the vision, and often just before the big achievement, comes apparent failure and discouragement.
What the research says
Writing it down changes results
Two well-known research studies point the same way. Putting goals and gratitude in writing changes what people feel now, go on to do next and accomplish over time.
Goals in writing
Psychologist Gail Matthews followed 149 people over four weeks. At the end, each person rated, on a scale of 1 to 10, how far they had achieved their goals. The marks show the group averages.
4.3
7.6
1 10
- Held goals in mind
- Wrote goals, committed to actions and sent a weekly progress report to a friend
1 week
In the original 2005 study by Martin Seligman and colleagues, writing down three things that went well each day for a week, and why they went well, raised happiness for the following six months. A 2012 replication found lasting gains in happiness too.
Acknowledging your accomplishments takes deliberate attention. This exercise gives that attention a place to land.
Sources: Matthews, G., Goals Research Summary, Dominican University of California (participants rated their own achievement after four weeks). Seligman, M., Steen, T., Park, N. and Peterson, C. (2005), Positive psychology progress, American Psychologist 60(5). Mongrain, M. and Anselmo-Matthews, T. (2012), Journal of Clinical Psychology 68(4).
In their words
What people take from completing the year
When I first started this process I asked myself what have I achieved? Now I completed it I can see that I have made a fundamental shift in who I am as a person and a leader within my organisation and my personal life. I feel confident, still and focused.
Cutting through the clutter and the noise gives me the clarity I need to be an effective leader. I am looking forward to a succinct and effective year ahead.
Niven
Taking these sections in smaller chunks has felt a lot more achievable than trying to work it out. It has helped me focus on a smaller, more refined list, which I believe will help me achieve more in the long run.
Vicki
What a useful and simple, and profound process.
Aaron
I look forward to another year of growth and evolution.
Paul
Good way to keep one on track.
Raktim
Your turn
Complete your year
Nine short answers, written in your own words. Settle somewhere quiet, give yourself unhurried time, and let the year show you what it holds.
Clarity
See the year whole, and what it taught you, before the next one begins.
Acknowledgement
Naming what you created and completed lets gratitude consolidate it.
Direction
Three written commitments give the first weeks of the new year a course to follow.
Continuity
We send your words back to you a couple of times through the year, so your learning, accomplishments and commitments stay present with you.
A year from now you may wish you had started today.
Karen Lamb
Your year
Nine lines across three short pages
Insights first, then accomplishments, then commitments. A copy arrives in your inbox the moment you finish.
Your words are kept safe. We send them back to you a couple of times through the year to re-presence what you learned, accomplished and chose.