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Resources from this episode:

Planning Worksheet

Show Notes:

So this year I'm doing something a little different. I decided early in November that I am not thinking about or planning for next year until next year in January. I am all in for 2023. I want to be present and finish this year strong. My eyes are on my kids, my husband, Christmas, and New Year's, and I just, for whatever reason, feel so strongly in my spirit that I need to not take time and energy in this month to plan and look at it. This is so different for me. Okay. I am a planner. I am a forward thinker. But there's just been some different life circumstances that have led me to this, so this episode is all about some end-of-year rhythms for reflecting on your year and how you can finish this year strong.

For the full episode, hit play above or read through below.

There have been a couple of things that have happened in my life over the last couple months that are the kind of things I just don't want to share really with the whole world and so I'm just going to keep them close to my heart. But what they have done, they've taught me, that sometimes life can look different. I don't have to lead the exact same life or do the same things that I've always done, and sometimes it's actually unhealthy to force yourself to do things the way that you've always done them.

So what that looks like for me is this year I'm just not taking the time in December to plan ahead for the upcoming year like I normally do. Part of me feels like this is going against everything I've ever taught and everything that I've ever said or done but man it feels good because I feel like I am not forcing myself to do something that I'm not ready to do and it feels like I really just want to focus on being so present with this year. I mean, my kids, this Christmas they’re two, five, I paused because Beaufort will have just turned five before Christmas, two, five, six, and eight and Will and I have remarked about how it feels like a golden year of Christmas. Those ages are just so innocent and beautiful and I just don't want to crisscross in my brain, thinking of planning anything for next year while also being here with them this year.

So it's different. I'm just going to say it's different. I feel like God is just up to something in my heart and life and I can't really put it to words. But. I'm grateful and I really feel like it's a gift to just focus on being present and reflecting over my year. So this episode is going to be all about very simple questions to ask yourself to reflect over last year and just a little bit of encouragement from me.

So one thing that I'm going to do, so my favorite questions that I like to ask myself as I reflect on the last year, are two questions: what is working and what is not working? Phrased another way, what worked this year and what didn't work this year?

If you can just take one sheet of paper and divide it into 2 columns and just let everything come out of your mind onto paper while answering those 2 questions, what worked, what didn't, it is going to be so incredibly insightful and helpful for you as you reflect back over the last year. And whenever you are at the point where you're kind of planning ahead or looking ahead towards the next year um those questions will be very helpful in helping determine your next steps forward. So that's my encouragement to you. Taking time to reflect is just taking the time to answer those two questions what worked and what didn't.

Another way that I love to reflect is taking the time to celebrate, really celebrate the year that you've had. One of my favorite things I do with Will every year is we have our Christmas dinner date and we go to a beautiful restaurant. We usually try to choose one that's decorated nicely for Christmas and we talk through the year. We talk through everything that we can possibly remember about the year, mostly focusing on the highlights, the trips, the milestones, the successes, the wins, and everything we can celebrate. But we also have found it really important to include some of the heartaches and some of the failures and just reflecting on the gift of the year that we've been given because it's not all wins and successes a lot of times. There's some real heartaches and some real failures in there and that's okay. But it's really important I think just to say “Hey this was what made this year this year” and just sitting with it is really a gift.

So try to bring a sheet of paper or even my journal but sometimes we've forgotten and we've been known to scribble all of that down on the back of a napkin or a menu and so if you can remember to bring something try to do that I loved to like write it out because we try to not keep our phones with us on the table at dinner because it's just distracting. So, trying to to remember to bring paper and pen is a good thing.

If you have a team that you work with, celebrating with them is so fun and so important. When I had my team of wedding photographers and family photographers, we would all go out with our spouses to a big dinner at the end of the year and we would go around and each of us, we place our order for our meal, then we would all write out our top 10 favorite memories from work that year and we would all go around and share them and they resulted in so much laughter and so much fun. So I just encourage you if you have a team that you work with, take the time to celebrate your work with them.

Then do something for yourself. Just book yourself a massage or a facial or something just to say “Hey I did that. We did that this year.” If there is a lot of work and a lot of play that went into this year and let's just celebrate all that this year was just by treating yourself and enjoying that and just saying “Hey another year another trip around the sun is in the books.” So I love to take the time to do those things.

If you're looking for a resource to just help plan your year I know usually I go through that a little bit in onw of my podcast episodes in December, head to nancyray.com/planning. I do have a free download that includes my personal audit, my work audit, my hour-by-hour schedule of how I would host my end-of-the-year planning for my team, and my end-of-year checklist.

While I feel like I'm not going to be doing all of those things this year, I recognize that it might be a year where you really are excited to do those things. So if that is going to be a helpful resource to you, I want you to have it. It's free, just head to nancyray.com/planning and you can get all my tools and even a few more like those audits, the personal audit, work audit those are really great tools for reflection and ask some really thought-provoking questions. So I definitely encourage you to go check out those resources and just use the ones that work best for you this year if you want to.

I'm just going to close out this very short episode by saying I just encourage you to be grateful and thankful for all the good and bad that this year has brought and take the time to reflect on that. It's a good thing. This is just kind of a tradition, I always say this, I wrote this email to my email list probably seven years ago now and I just got so many responses that I loved I just have loved turning it into a podcast episode and speaking it to you, just encouraging you to stay present. Don't move forward too fast. Don't look too far ahead too quickly. Stay present and finish this year's strong. Keep going, eyes on Him. You're almost there.

Take the time to look over your shoulder to grieve, to celebrate, and thank God for his faithfulness. Do your best to finish all you can. Clean out that inbox. Tie up all your loose ends. Don't give up on 2023 until it's over. It's not over yet. But if you don't get it all done and you don't feel like you have it in you to finish strong, I want to remind you that life ebbs and flows.

Sometimes we're going to finish strong and sometimes we'll finish trusting God to write the rest of the story. Sometimes we will finish but we won't know where we're headed. Sometimes we will finish peacefully. But one thing that brings comfort and hope: our work will never be done. Our to do lists will continue to grow and as 2023 comes to a close, don't rush it. As crazy as it has been It has also been a gift. Be thorough with these final days. Savor every moment of this beautiful, candlelit, song-filled, cinnamon-tasting season. Finish your work then be with your family. 2024 will come soon enough. When life feels undone and plans seem unclear we say “God I trust you.” When we're in the wait, we say “Your will be done.” When we feel lost or alone we say “God you are in this place.” When the world presses in on us, we say “Lord you are mighty.” And when we're feeling weak and defeated and tempted to offer words of ingratitude for the season we're in we say “God you are good. All the time you are good.”

Thanks for listening to episode 219 of Work and Play with Nancy Ray. Everything I've mentioned today can be found in the show notes at nancyray.com/podcast/219 and you can find me at nancyray.com or @nancyray on Instagram.

Zig Ziglar said,