This post includes how to accomplish a year-end review, how to sort experiences into a naughty list and a nice list, and instructions on creating a wish box. Read on!
As the 2022 winds down, it's time to do my annual year-end review. I do it to get a clear handle on what I spent my time and effort and attention on, and what manifested in my life. I contrast that with what I wish I'd spent more time and attention on, and what I wanted that didn't manifest. There will always be correlations between these two things. What we feed with our focus, grows and bears fruit.
This year has been a year of huge transition me. I've chosen to spend more time on writing, publishing, promotion, and as a result have had less time to devote to my Bliss Blog and Magic Shop. I'm pondering closing down the magic shop part of the site, and just keeping the blog and readings after the holidays. (Be sure to shop the Holiday Sale, because those items might not be replaced in the new year.)
Change is afoot. We are always changing, growing, and shifting our focus as we evolve into more and more and more.
My year-end review is a way to set aside real time to devote to an honest look back, which is necessary for the next step: Identifying and releasing the things that did not work for me. Identifying and celebrating the things that brought me joy.
And since some of us work better with guidelines, here's my notion of how this year-end review works.
Step 1: Identify
We need to identify what worked and what didn't, and write these down in two columns or on two pages, one for experiences and events that were wanted and pleasing, and one for those that were unwanted or displeasing.
Ask the following questions, and spend a lot of time and thought on each one before writing out your answer in the apropriate column or page. You can use the keyboard or pen and ink or typewriter, whatever floats your boat.
What did I spend most of my time doing, being, thinking about?
What do I wish I had spent more time doing, being, thinking about?
What do I wish I had spent less time doing, being, thinking about?
What happened this year that felt hard and unpleasant?
What happened this year that felt easy and pleasant?
Step 2: The Naughty List
Spend a moment on the things on the "unpleasant" side of your list. The things that were hard. These are things you must release. The thing is, they will not go until they have delivered their message, because that's all difficult times are; messages, in code, pointing us away from what is, toward what would be better. I try to see what the hard times were pointing me toward, and to understand that is where I'm going. Into the solution.
Once I've seen the solution, I can thank the "problem" and wish it well. Its purpose has been served. The solution will be one of my top areas of focus in the new year.
Step 3: The Nice List
Spend a few moments going over your list of experiences and events that felt good to you. Big things as well as small things. Work things as well as personal things. It helps me to go over my planner, which I always fill with information until about March and then let slide, but still... A look at my calendars will remind me of a lot of events.
Take this list of good things, and read it over, remembering and relishing each incident as if it were new. (This is not a step we take with the Naughty List. Ever.) Bask in the good things the year brought. Every compliment, every unexpected payment, every moment in the presence of love. Every holiday light and wavering smile. Every sappy movie. Every kiss. Every rainbow. Every stroke of luck. Every accomplishment. Every dollar that came. Recall each of these to mind in a slide show of emotion, and feel it all again.
Acknowledge that the feeling of bliss is the goal, and that everything we desire, we desire because we believe having it will bring us bliss. Acknowledge too, that we already have an abundance of bliss in our lives right now, and recall to mind all the countless moments of bliss over the past year. Feel the bliss of those moments again.
By paying attention to the bits of bliss over the past year, we tune ourselves to wavelength of bliss, allowing us to see more and more of it in our lives, both already there, and flooding in anew. Because like attracts like, and when we bask in bliss, we align with bliss, and become bliss magnets.
Step 4: The wish box.
Burn the Naughty List safely, with thanks, and as its smoke rises, see its essence leaving you, replaced by the solution you now understand.
The Nice List will live in your wish box. Choose a beautiful box that will only be used use for spells that involve wishes. Upon my wish box is written: "Whatever I put into this box becomes!" Inscribe yours with the intent of it being a wish-granting device. Take the Nice List, and all the things that were good, and that you want more of, and put it into your wish box.
Say:
Into my magic box you go,
Goddess Power, through me flow,
Bring me in alignment with,
This wish I wish, this spell I give
By air and fire, By land and sea,
and by my will so mote it be
I remove the wish from the box when it has manifested as my new reality. I also remove a wish if I evolve past wanting it. I never remove an ungranted wish I still desire, though I might freshen them up from time to time. Believe it as if it is done, and don't fuss over it. Move on to new wishes.
Step 5: Afterward
From there, I just go forth more aware of what my priorities are. I take with me the intent to spend more time doing what I love and less time on unpleasant things. I will head into 2023 freshly reminded of the bliss I found in 2022, and able to conjure that blissful feeling easily with each memory, and knowing too, that there will be even more moments like that in the year to come. Because the more aware I am of bliss, the more bliss will find me.
And that's my idea of a year-end review. Do you have a year-end practice? Share in comments!
