I love sitting down with my journal, getting in the Word and, asking God what does this next year hold? What story of His do I get to be a part of? Around this time of year I start to get antsy. Vacation is over. We have overstayed our welcome at my in-laws for 7 STRAIGHT DAYS, and I am ready to forge ahead. I start thinking of these big ideas and I just want to get after it. PLOW down everything in my way if I have to. Grant lovingly refers to me as a BULL in a CHINA closet many times.
But, because I love action, I many times forget one of the most important things. Take a deep breath
(go ahead do that with me) PAUSE… REFLECT, REMEMBER, and GIVE THANKS on this past year.
Many leaders who were interviewed about goal setting and success, said the first thing they did before they started in on their New Year plans was to REFLECT on their past year.
I want to remember to give thanks for what God did for us in a year of CHANGE and TRANSITION. (Saying Goodbye to beyond dream-life friends; moving to STL to be with family; starting new businesses out of the home; new friends; living with in-laws; finding a house one day before school starts for Holden; finding a more suitable house a mere 10 hours later; switching houses and schools AGAIN; switching from private to public school, which could be a whole other blog post; (I may have cried out of JOY and RELIEF when I met Holden’s sweet perfect teacher. God was ever reminding me he had my kid’s back).
When I write it all down it overwhelms me a bit. Did all that really happen this past year? But as I REFLECT, REMEMBER, and GIVE THANKS, I am reminded that every single thing that happened in this past year; the easy, the hard, the new, the old, the frustrating, the surprise-knock-my-socks off blessings; it was all wrapped in a big blanket of grace and provision just perfect for me. The me, who was nervous and fearful. The me, who loves adventure but needs her family to be OK in the process. The me, who learned to trust with a faith she hasn’t had to muster up in a long time.
A blogger recently asked the question “what regrets do you have from last year?”I choose not to look at the regrets, because I would live in that world for days. It would be an icky dark place of what I “woulda, coulda, shoulda” done. Those things will pop up in my reflections but, I won’t LIVE there. “The most important thing I do at the beginning of a new year is leave the old year where it fell,” Jon Acuff says. “It’s good to learn from the year you just lived, but if you stare at it too long, regret over the opportunities you missed or mistakes you made will blossom.”
Today I was challenged to REFLECT on the past and come up with a word that might describe this past year. I ALWAYS choose a word at the BEGINNING of the year to focus on. This word describes the theme for my goals and my pursuits and passions. It is many times a word I didn’t want to have, but God seems to know what my heart needs more than I do. Go figure
You can see what God placed on my heart for 2014 here. But I haven’t ever thought of having a word that REFLECTS my past year.
You know I am NOT a person of “few” words, so I thought of more than a few.
MY PAST YEAR WORDS:
- TRANSITION
- CHANGE
- HARD
- NEW
- GOODBYES
- HELLOS
- PURPOSEFUL
- MEANING
- FAMILY
- MEMORIES
- ADVENTURE
- GOD’S RIDICULOUS PROVISION
- OPPORTUNITY
No matter where we find ourselves, even if we don’t want to be there we can still BLOOM. It may not be the blooming we desire, and it might not be what we had planned. But I believe all of us no matter how hard, thorny, rough the path, can BLOOM, we can be our beautiful self even in the pain and hard. I have seen it this year first hand from those who suffered and endured their hardest hard.
I will continue to PAUSE, REMEMBER, REFLECT, and GIVE THANKS the next few days, before I get so crazy with the things I want to plan for next year. I will look at my goals in my Whitney English Day Designer, from last year and see what worked and what was a total flop. Will you join me in reflecting and remembering your year.
I would love to hear what your REFLECTION words are for this past year….
“Evaluated reflection turns experience into insight.”
—JOHN MAXWELL