Happy New Year

Let's start the year with a Review, Reflect & Extract the best of 2023

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Hey, gorgeous, and welcome to the Start over podcast.

So why is it that it's important to reflect and review?

Well, I think there's a perfect example in myself as to why this is important.

Now, I don't know what kind of year you've had.

And in many ways, I.

I am a party to that.

I am definitely somebody in that camp.

However, it's important that we don't let something that maybe is highly emotional, that had a big impact on us be the only thing that, you know, overrides everything else.

So.

So what I mean by that is I know I'm not alone in that I lost somebody very, very close to me and then just before Christmas, I lost someone else.

And so it's been a year of loss.

So earlier this year, we had an unexpected, very unexpected cancer diagnosis and we lost.

We lost Mum.

And she was a very integral part of our lives, of my life, of my children's lives, and, you know, for us as a family.

And so it was all a bit of a shock.

There were also some really good things that happened, some as a result of her, you know, becoming ill.

And it's important to kind of extrapolate all of those things as well.

Now, just before Christmas, we also lost my aunt.

And so it has it.

It did feel a bit like, oh, my God, you know, like, how many?

But I know I'm not alone.

It's very much, you know, one of those things that this is life, right?

We have lost and we have to.

We have to move on as best.

As best we can without those people, you know, in our lives.

So it's very easy to let one thing just override it.

But really it is very comforting to go back over the whole of the year.

And so that's what we're going to do.

And before, before we Start, I want you just to gather a couple of things because to either press, pause and run off and do it, or listen to this and then do it again later.

But ideally, I want you to have.

Give yourself the luxury of sort of between 20 and 30 minutes max to do this.

Cause you will.

You will gain loads from it.

So grab your diary or your calendar so that you're able to sort of start, you know, in January and go through and remind yourself of.

Of any events or specific things that actually happened.

Because those things can actually trigger, you know, thoughts about how you felt at the time.

And, you know, they're just nice little prompts to have.

I do know that some of my clients have used, like their Facebook feed.

Simple as that.

They just go back over their Facebook feed and, and can extrapolate some.

Some key things from there.

Some really good reminders.

I also want you to get a paper and a pen, because as you're doing this, I want you to be writing stuff down.

When we write things down, it just embeds.

It helps us process information in a completely different way.

So if you just think about it, there's less of an impact as if you think about it and you actually write it down.

So I want you to do that, and then I want you to get comfy, and I want you to also write down between eight and 10 key areas of your life that are important to you.

So what I mean by that is I'll give you some examples.

So things that are important to me that I want to sort of monitor and, you know, do a level of analysis on are my family relationships, my relationship with my partner, my business, and my mental health, my fitness.

You get the idea.

I also have a section which is called Adventure, because a few years ago, I really found that it was something that I needed in my life.

I needed to put an area of my life called adventure.

Because it's just something that my personality responds to that I've identified that I need.

So I have that section for someone else.

It might be religion or spirituality, or it might be unity.

You know, it's personal to you.

There is no right and wrong.

It's personal to you.

But write down those areas because as we go through this process, I want you to apply it to all of those different areas.

Okay?

So you can get a really good analysis of what your year was, was like.

So the first thing that I want you to do, you've gathered all your things together now, is I want you to take that first piece of paper and I want you to draw a line down the center of it so that you've got two sections, and in one side, it doesn't matter which one, I want you to put what went well, and on the other side, I want you to put what didn't go well, or rephrase it however you want.

Sometimes people say things that went not so well.

The idea is that you've got, you know, good stuff that went on and not such good stuff that went on, and just fill it in and you'll probably find that, you know, you'll dart around on those two, on those two columns, and that is absolutely fine.

So this things to think about are, you know, when you're thinking about things that went well, what successes did you have?

You know, did you achieve any qualifications?

Did you take up a new hobby?

Were you successful with instilling a new habit?

You know, did your fitness increase?

Did you have more fun?

Did you meet new people?

You know, all of those things, thinking about the different areas of your life, get it all down on paper.

When you're thinking about the things that didn't go well, think about those life curveballs.

Think about the things that were not in your control.

Think about any mistakes you made or failures that happen.

And I'm using these terms really loosely because, you know, failures can be seen as a negative, but you may then have something that went really well as a result.

So again, it's a personal thing.

It's things that you felt didn't go well, and they, they may be key events or it could be how you dealt with something or how you handled something or a particular situation.

So go through those and just get as much as you possibly can thinking about all the different areas in your life.

Think also in terms of how you felt about things.

So you may have had something that went really well, but maybe, you know, your enjoyment of it wasn't quite what you expected.

It could be the other way around.

It could be that, you know, something went wrong.

But actually what went really well was that you proved that you could totally step up during a crisis.

And, you know, perhaps you found a new.

A whole new set of skills or surprised yourself with something that you were able to deal with that you haven't been tested on before.

Okay, so when you've got all of this down, the next thing I want you to do is to extrapolate, extrapolate all the things that you learned from writing all of those things down.

So when you're thinking about 20, 23 as a year, what are the key takeaways for you.

What did you learn about yourself?

And you'll be looking at, you know, this from a perspective of what went well and what didn't go well.

So write those things down.

And things to be sort of mindful of are, what did you learn about yourself?

What did you.

What surprised you?

What did you learn about your relationships or the people in your life?

What did you learn about things that affected your mental health?

What were the things that, you know, you learned that energized you or that drained you?

Okay, pull out everything that is relevant in terms of what do you need?

What have you learned about yourself that you can carry forward, that can help you become a better person or to achieve more?

Or what have you learned that maybe you need to avoid?

Did something come up this year that just proved to be like kryptonite to you?

Okay, so go through all of that and pull out what you learned.

And some of them can.

It's funny because look into all of it.

You know, as I mentioned earlier, we had a terrible, terrible situation with mum.

But there were so many things that we.

That I learned that I will be taking forward that will never leave me for the rest of my life.

And what I mean by that is, you know, what did I learn this year?

Oh, my goodness.

I learned that life is short, that, you know, life is a very precious thing and that we.

There are some things in our lives that we just don't see coming.

And so, you know, what does that.

What does that teach me?

What's teaching me that, you know what?

When I've been going, oh, I don't like to do that, or I might be worried that someone's going to think X, Y and Z about me?

I'm a lot less.

Honestly, this experience has changed me immensely.

Is that actually going to stop me from living my life, from actually doing what I want to do?

Because of the experience that I've had this year, it's, you know, it gave me the ability to go back to basics.

I simplified my life.

You know, I realized when.

When we found out about the diagnosis, for example, it was like, right, okay, what's really important right now?

Well, you know what?

Me building my business can go on hold on the other side of things, me going through my professional coaching course, I really wanted to make sure that if I could carry on with that, that I did.

And I.

And I reprioritized.

Actually, that's more important than me spending time building my business right now.

Spending time with my mum clearly was a number one priority.

Being there for, you know, my children and making sure we still had a roof over our heads.

It really was a case of what is important to me and certainly things like my, my fitness that changed, you know, the level of fitness that I was, I was doing, you know, the amount of activities that I was doing around it, I was like, that's got to cut down.

I didn't like, you know, I wasn't going to go off hiking in Wales because I didn't want to go too far away from my mum at the time.

So, you know, all of these things are really fundamental to, you know, the satellite events that happened around a big event of losing mum.

So it's, yeah, really have a look when you say, what have you learned this year?

Delve into that level of learning, that level of self awareness because my goodness, there are so many great things, you know, great things to, to.

To come out of all sorts of different circumstances and yeah, to, to really.

I lived a life where I actually felt fully aligned with what was important to me and to experience that was immensely, is proving to be immensely powerful in how I'm moving forward in my life now.

I really hope that makes sense.

I've kind of gone off piste a little bit here, but I think actually that's, that's meant to happen sometimes.

So yeah, it doesn't mean that this is only stuff that comes from, you know, losing a loved one.

It could be some other experience that you've had.

There are plenty of them that are like life quakes, right, that kind of shake you up and make you reassess lots of ways that you live your life or things that you do or how much time you worry about, you know, particular people in your life.

When, when something major happens, all of a sudden it just pales into insignificance.

And so what can you take from that that can enrich and enhance your life moving forward?

Very, very powerful stuff.

Okay, so let's just have a quick recap there.

So we've gone through what went well, what didn't go so well, and then, you know, what have you learned?

What are the key takeaways that you've learned about yourself or, you know, how you live your life or your values, your beliefs, all those kind of good, good things.

So bearing all of that in mind, what I want you to do next is take another piece of paper, put a line down the middle as you did, and in here you're going to have a section where it's be more.

Have more.

It's more what?

More what?

More needs to feature in your life, moving forward.

So it could be that you discovered, do you know what, you had a new hobby and you had more fun, right?

It was a year where actually you really enjoyed some good times in your life.

What, so what is it that you need more of to make that happen again?

And it could be as simple as, you know, you discovered that it is fun to be more playful.

And as a result of being more playful, you.

You were a happier person.

So it's almost like, okay, great, so in your personal life, you might have been very playful.

How can you now get more of and inject it into other parts of your life that are important?

So it could be, how can you inject more fun into some of your relationships?

Or how can you inject more fun into your business?

Because if you associate that have by having more fun in your life, you became more productive or more creative or more relaxed, then that's something that you want more of.

On the other side of things, what do you want less of?

You know, what do you think you could now let go of?

What could you do less of?

What do you need less of?

And it might be, I want less hassle in my life, less complication in my life.

I need less, you know, to lessen my social life, for example, get it all down on paper.

And this stuff is the start of boundaries.

So on the next bit, I want you to concentrate on people who featured in your life in a big way this year.

Now, it could be because of certain circumstances that a particular person came into your life in.

In a new capacity.

It could be that you met new people.

I have to say, I very much feel that this year introduced plenty of new people into my life.

And there are, you know, some, some key characters that actually have kind of like swooped into my story and almost gone straight into one of my inner circles of, you know, a network people that I'm like, my goodness, we shared an experience.

We, we had a bond.

There's, you know, something very new that has been injected into my life.

So it's quite good to kind of have a look at that, you know, who, who do you want to be making sure they rise in the ranks on who you spend your time with this, you know, in this coming year.

And I do, I like looking at people because I think we have plenty of people that come into our life for.

There's that lovely saying that, you know, they come into your life for a reason or a season.

Some people come in, have a big impact and then they move on.

You know, because you both have evolved and things have changed and you have very fondness, you know, memories of that person.

But actually they're not going to feature heavily in your life moving forward.

It can be that you've got people who have been in your life for a very long time and you've changed and evolved together and they will always be there in your like inner circle.

So it's really nice to really sit down and I get such gratitude, you know, I get to demonstrate such gratitude for key people in my life as well.

And, and I think it's just a lovely exercise and it can be very fulfilling and give you.

You know, one thing I like about this is I am much more conscious about keeping in touch with the people that are so important to me in my life.

There was a time when I had a big social life.

I had lots of different networks that, you know, I was working all the time.

And to be honest, it was way too.

So now I've entered into a phase in my life where I feel it's much more sort of quality over quantity.

And I couldn't have got to that point unless I reviewed and reflected and actually spent some time thinking about the reality of how my life operated and who was operating within it.

So I very much encourage you to do the same.

It's, it's great, great stuff.

And then finally what was missing, and this is one that it might be that at the start of the year you had an intention to achieve something.

And you know, by going through your analysis, you realize actually it was the wrong year for it.

And it's something that really does need to feature in this particular year coming up.

So what didn't happen that you set out to achieve?

Because sometimes, here's the thing you might think to yourself, I was really intentional about that.

It didn't happen.

And now it doesn't matter now.

It's not, it's just not relevant.

It's not something that you want to work towards in your coming year.

It's something that kind of has just fallen by the wayside.

And actually that's.

You've got so much information here now.

And what I really encourage you to do is look at what has changed.

And it could be if you've experienced loss or divorce or you know, any of those sort of life quake things.

What has changed for you?

Now?

Sometimes it can be.

I was working with somebody earlier this year who had experienced a near miss, okay?

So they, they almost died.

And so now everything has changed for them.

You know, their, their whole outlook on life has changed.

It could be something more joyous.

Maybe you've become a parent or a grandparent and life is never the same because you've got this new person, you know, this new little life that maybe is dependent upon you or that, you know, you adore and looks different.

So what has changed?

What has evolved for you?

Think about your boundaries, think about all of these things.

All of these things, all of the little things, all of the parts of the journey, process, it's going to be different, you know, so how have you changed?

And that's as much as I want you to do now.

I realize that there's a lot in there, but even if you've just listened to this episode and a few key things have popped up for you, then I would love to hear from you.

What I want you to do with all of this now is you've got it down on paper and you're going to find that, you know, as you're going about your business for the rest of the day, things are going to pop into your head.

And if you can get them on the same piece of paper, it's great, great knowledge.

So if you got this far, well done, well done.

Because this is big stuff, right?

But I absolutely love it because this is, you know, when people say, oh, you've got to do the inner work.

And before I really got into all of this, I was like, what does that actually mean?

What is the inner work?

This.

This stuff is the inner work.

Because sometimes it can feel really uncomfortable to be able to go back over something and review and reflect upon it and think about it and process it.

You know, we can put lots of barriers in our way and say, no, do you know what?

I'd rather avoid it because it makes me feel uncomfortable.

So this is the kind of stuff, this is part of doing the inner work.

So congratulate yourself on that.

And I look forward to hearing how you've got on.

You can contact me through social media.

The links are in the show notes, so allow that to process.

Let it soak in.

Go do something else after it.

You know, let your brain do something else, because it'll all be going on in your subconscious, and we're going to use some of that to help you decide exactly what it is you want to be going for in the coming year.

And as ever, if you did enjoy this episode, maybe you can think of somebody who would benefit from it.

Please do share it with them and make sure that you subscribe or follow the podcast, and then you won't miss the next episode.

And thanks for joining me.

You take care.