Ferate's 5: Use Your End of the Year Review To Thrive. (027)

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First off, my last name is Ferate like karate with an F or kinda like, Ferrari.

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What’s up, everyone? I am super curious, want to be the best version of myself and continue to evolve just like all of you. It’s easy to think ahead, identify goals, and constantly ask what’s next in the new year. But before we get into planning 2024 it is important to look back on 2023.

Ferate’s 5 Scouting Report.

1. End of the year review.

2. James Clear's quote on becoming.

3. Tools I have used in previous years

4. Applying those tools to Sahil Bloom’s Annual Review

It’s that time of year, right before the holidays, to reflect on your experiences and what you have learned. It’s important to reflect on your actions, decisions, and habits to make sure they align with who you want to become.

I know I know I know I have said this 100 times…

So here are the tools I have used to reflect on my previous year and become more of type of person I want to be.

I first used the Past Year Review framework from Tim Ferriss and the modified version that was created by Dickie Bush. Tim Ferriss recommended writing out two columns, one positive and the other negative for every week of your entire year. Could be people, experiences, adventures, and commitments. Then recommends taking the next step and identifying your 80/20, “What 20% of each column produced the most reliable or powerful peaks?” Dickie’s notion template is awesome, working through similar concepts of milestones, wins, and mistakes with more in-depth lists.

The tool that I loved the most from both of these is using your Google Calendar and photo camera roll on your phone to remind you of how you spend your energy, time, and attention. It is easy to forget and not remember the nitty gritty details. I’m guilty of this and I even feel like I have a pretty great memory.

Using photos as a reminder for experiences and your Google Calendar as a rough estimate of your commitments upgrades your understanding and self-awareness. For example, a simple photo of a coffee can remind me of that week I took a trip to visit buddies or that weekend I just hit a run after going to write at Cathedral Coffee.

Previous Tools + This Year’s Addition.

This year I made a change. I am using the Google Calendar + camera roll photo combo, applying that to Sahil Bloom’s annual review, and most of all wanted to share that with you.

Sahil started it off with this thought by John Dewey, “We do not learn from experience… we learn from reflecting on experience.”

It instantly reminded me of this question/idea from Shaan Puri, “do we actually learn the right life lessons from our experiences and failures?” Often you hear entrepreneurs or coaches say “Fail fast” or “What is your failure resume?” but the important part isn’t just the failure it is learning the correct lesson from the action, reflecting, and then making a high-quality next step.

Sahil Bloom’s Personal Annual Review. LINK

1. What did I change my mind on this year?

   1. What “software updates” did I have?

   2. This reminded me of Daniel Kahneman's idea of learning and being wrong in Adam Grant’s book Think Again, “When you discover that you’re wrong about something, it means you’re less wrong than you were before.”

2. What created energy this year?

   1. Make these a priority.

   2. Activities, people, experiences, projects, etc

3. What drained energy this year?

   1. Did you cut them out in real-time or let them persist?

   2. Bison go into the storm, livestock run away and are in the stressor longer.

4. Who were the boat anchors in my life?

   1. Who or what is holding you back from potential?

5. What did I not do because of fear?

   1. Downside of fear? Upside of fear?

   2. “We suffer more in imagination than in reality.” Seneca

   3. “I am an old man and have known a great many troubles, but most of them never happened.” Mark Twain.

6. What were my greatest hits and worst misses this year?

   1. objective view to see both

   2. Why were they hits? Why were they misses?

7. What did I learn this year?

   1. Reflect on previous questions and answers.

   2. Any other big picture or little lessons you learned that weren’t covered?

The person who gets hurt the most by being vague in this process is yourself. Something I continue to battle with. It’s vital to double-click on your responses and be as specific as possible. It is also important to not spend ALL your time reflecting. Impact comes from taking action.

It feels good, at least to me, to work through these annual reviews but it is important to realize motion is ruminating on planning and action gets you closer to your desired outcome. It's kind of like checking yourself out in the mirror while working out. Seeing progress in the mirror might get you some dopamine in the moment but it doesn’t get you more jacked or in better shape for the future.

At some point, you need to take action and train to get the results.

At some point, you need to take action toward making 2024 the best year of your life.

Wishing you all love & consistency. Keep stacking those daily deposits and making every day the best day of the year, until tomorrow…

Ferate