✦Seasonal · 11 recordsReview the year

Most years are forgotten by February of the next one. This is a couple of hours with the calendar and the photos, written down properly — and it ends by choosing what comes next, because a review with no decision in it is nostalgia.

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✦ Everything it creates

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Goal

A written review, and three things chosen Week 3

Ends with a decision. A review with none is nostalgia.

Remember it properly Day 10

With the calendar and the photos, not from memory.

  • Go through the calendar month by monthDo firstDay 4
  • Write what happened, what worked, what I would not repeatDo firstDay 8
  • Write the one thing I learnedDo firstDay 9

Choose next year Week 3

While the evidence is still in front of me.

  • Pick three things for next yearDo firstWeek 2
  • Put the first task for each in the diaryWeek 3

Routines

  • Note one thing worth rememberingweekly
✦ It puts something in the calendar

Dates you will not have to remember

New Year's Eve

31 December18:00
✦ It comes with a note

Do it with the calendar open

Remembering a year unaided produces the three things that happened most recently and almost nothing from the first eight months. The calendar and the photos do the work.\n\nIt ends with three things for next year because a review with no decision in it is nostalgia. Chosen now, with the evidence in front of you, they are better chosen than in January.

✦ Questions

Review the year, answered.

Two or three hours, ideally in one sitting with the calendar and the photos open. Trying to remember a year unaided produces the three things that happened most recently and almost nothing from the first eight months.
What happened, what worked, what you would not repeat, and what you learned. The last one is the part people skip and the only one that changes anything about the following year.
Because a review with no decision in it is nostalgia. Three things chosen while the evidence of the last year is in front of you are far better chosen than three picked cold in January.
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Records gathered over weeks, submitted well before the deadline, and money set aside for the bill.

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