In: Reflection, Out: Resolutions

What if reflection wasn’t a one-time thing?

There’s a lotta pressure right now to perfectly package 2024 and put a nice big bow on it.

Collective pressure to clearly mark time with an End and Beginning, even though it’s really just The Middle.

Many are taking a pause to ask themselves:

What happened this year?

Did I accomplish enough?

What does it all mean?

Every year it feels urgent, especially as the clock tick tick ticks toward midnight. We want our ducks in a row on January 1. We want the perfect vision board, the perfect goal(s), the perfect dramatic reinvention.

“This is our year!” we declare and post a New era loading… reel on IG.

While I absolutely encourage and celebrate reflection whenever and however it comes, I want to remind you that reflection is most efficacious when it becomes a regular practice.

You don’t have to only take stock in the last weeks of December. Big insights don’t have to happen just once a year.

Journaling reveals yourself to you all the time (especially when we Journal, together). It’s a constant tending to your self-awareness.

The gift of consistently asking ourselves questions is that our reflections add up to something powerful, meaningful, and affirming. As a result, we naturally begin to move in the direction of a life that feels aligned.

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Let’s be honest: our hyper-productive, achievement-obsessed culture loves a good dramatic reinvention.

But guess what? You don’t have to buy in.

I’m personally reframing how I see this time — more of a gentle marker than a finish line.

It is winter after all — a time that invites us to deliberately slow down. A time that reminds us there is no rush despite living in the Amazon Prime age.

I recently read that gardeners often take this time to “winter” themselves; resting, browsing seed catalogs, and envisioning what their gardens will look like. Then, in about six weeks’ time as it gets closer to spring, that’s when they begin to seed their ideas, make plans for planting, and prepare for spring and summer.

Side note: New Year’s used to be celebrated on March 25, closer to the spring equinox!

What would it look like for you to take a cue from nature this winter and spend the first few weeks of January just reflecting and dreaming?

When we focus on drastically overhauling our habits, change feels big, hairy, and scary. We think of all the things we need to take away or stop doing. All the ways in which we aren’t measuring up, where we’re not enough, or where we’re too much. What’s going wrong or what’s wrong with us.

That’s not a mental space I want to hang out in.

Watch the video below for this week’s journal prompt that’s going to shift your focus and illuminate what’s going right.

If you like how I’m approaching the new year, then you’ll LOVE my next journaling workshop, ✨New Year, More Me✨

This isn’t your typical January resolutions/goal planning workshop.

No spreadsheets. No over-the-top resolutions. And definitely no pressure to become a “new you.”

(Why did we ever feel the need to reinvent ourselves every January?! That’s exhausting… and exhaustion is not the vibe for 2025!)

We don’t need to become someone new. What we need is to connect more deeply with ourselves.

And that’s exactly what we’ll do in ✨New Year, More Me✨, a 75-minute journaling workshop that will turn self-reflection into a fun and inspiring way to start 2025.

This isn’t about overhauling your whole life or “fixing” anything about yourself.

It’s about embracing where you are, celebrating how far you’ve come, and dreaming about the coming year, all in a way that feels true to YOU.

By focusing less on resolutions and more on reflection you will get laser focused on what matters to you, with journaling prompts that spark clarity and inspiration.

You’ll leave with a fresh perspective, renewed energy, and a vision for the upcoming year that feels as natural as it is meaningful.

I can’t wait to share (and do) these prompts with you on Friday, January 3!

After hosting 18 (!) *free* weekly journaling sessions last year, I’m introducing two updates for 2025:

Journal, together will shift to Fridays and be held bi-weekly.

I love this change for us because to me, Fridays have an energy of anticipation and relaxation. The end of the week means less “doing” and problem-solving, which opens us up to receiving emotional clarity and guidance from our intuition.

Plus, Friday is ruled by Venus, the planet of connection and inner harmony. It embodies the energy of beauty, love, alignment, and connection to self and others. I can’t think of a better energetic environment for journaling!

If you’re new here, hi! Journal, together is the free bi-weekly journaling workshop I host.

Along with 3 powerful prompts curated around a specific theme or topic, a live journaling guide (me! 🙋🏻‍♀️), engaging group dialogue (totally optional), you get community, empathy, and connection.

In an effort to continue to share my gifts and talents more often, here is a poem I wrote filled with all the hopes I have for you (and me).