Over three years of doing annual reflections (quarterly as well) I wrote down the process that I created while doing it. Having a process to follow works for me, even though I often don’t use it or only refer back to it in the end for a check-up.
So why on earth do I bother with having (and keeping updated) a process if I don’t use it?
Apart from me wanting to know precisely what I am doing so I can share it, having a process serves me the first few times that I attempt something new, to have the nerve to just take the first step instead of being overwhelmed.
Anyway, my little ‘process’ starts in November or something with buying Leonie Dawson’s Goal getter workbooks. I buy both the life version and the business version. These are work books that help you reflect on the old year and make plans for the new year. I only use about 1/3rd of the questions and skip the rest. Yet, again, as a framework it helps me turn my mind towards what I want to do.
Anyway, the whole can be roughly divided into two parts:
- Looking back
- Looking forward
And even though I do often start with looking back and end with looking forward I don’t bother with keeping those phases strictly apart. But for the sake of describing to you what I do, it might seem that way.
Looking back
Sometimes I already spent some time with the looking back section of the life book around my birthday which is December 5. But mostly I open them a few times before and after Christmas. I always make sure I have at least two weeks off in those dark days. (But don’t pin yourself to a time or even a time of year. Any time will work as long as it works for you.) But before I do that I look through my last year work books to get some perspective on the at past that I will be building on.
This is much fun. It gives me perspective on change. Change that I only notice because I am being reminded of how something used to be.
Crunching the numbers
When my holidays start I first do some accounting. I am self employed so I send out my last invoices of the year, book my last expenses and finalise the whole thing. I have set up this process so it takes me not much time at all. In a few hours I am done and have a wonderful database to help me answer my many questions about how I did last year.
For me it is good to be very accurate when I answer a question like ‘did you spend your time like you wanted?’ I keep count (in my accounting software app) of what I spend my working days on. And I have a strong tendency to underestimate my efforts so having the actual data to see what’s true, helps me a lot.
Because of my numbers I can go from a vague dissatisfaction with my efforts with regards to my studies to the clarity of knowing that I spend 30% of my working hours on them. And realise that this is actually a rather impressive number, given the circumstances of my year. These kinds of vague dissatisfactions and worries happen often to me and they cause very real anxiety in my life and that chronic stress is in the way of creating the things I want to create. So I feel very blessed with this skill of keeping tabs that I developed over the years. It helps me stay reality based, from which I can dream and create much more effectively.
Knowing the exact numbers of my past year helps me stay away from anxiety and in reality.
It helps my mental sanity to look at the last year in a quantifiable way. Also when it shows me bad news. Because while I think through the questions and crunch the numbers, gradually an overall picture emerges of that last year. And bit by bit I start to understand why x did work and y did not.
And the lovely thing is that the insight into my last year goes from being vague and personal to being clear and precise and not personal at all.
I can do all this while my love or daughter is around, in a few lost hours here and there that I find under the Christmas tree. (of course I put them there 😉 )
But then the game changes. I am about to invoke the new year.
And for this I need alone time.
I usually find some of that after Christmas and often do it in big chunks like a whole day.
Looking ahead
Now it’s time to take out the big gun and this is called Structural Tension Charting, a form to support creation by Robert Fritz. I put this in the section of looking ahead but it actually starts with some more looking back 🙂
In these charts are my business plans that I have been working on for 3 years now. But not just my plans, also my overall goal, divided into subgoals and my current reality in relation to that overall goal and subgoals. I revise these charts quarterly at the changes of the sun cycle (equinoxes and longest and shortest day).
Structural Tension Charting
Structural Tension charting means that you look at your change efforts from the simplest structure possible. This structure has three elements.
3. My goal.
2. My action plan
1. My current reality in relation to that goal
Why the upside down listing of the numbers?
Because if you know you goal (3) and you know your working reality in relationship to that goal (1) you will easily figure out what you need to do to get from here to there (2).
3 – 1 = 2
It truly is.
This structure is powerful because it forces us to stop and look what’s here, right now. And you just have to look around at the state of the the world, at politics, at businesses and at the people in your life to see that this not a thing that we humans are very good at. We like to jump to conclusions, act before we think and hop from solving one problem to the next. Our mind is wired that way so it takes conscious effort to teach ourselves to create in a more objective and more effective way.
Another reason why Stuctural Tension Charting is powerful is because it creates clarity. It does away with vagueness, with fluff, with it being about you. It does away with all that stuff that is in the way of you and the act of creating your goal. Which of course will not save you from failing, falling on your face and other messy business that is part of being human. But it does save you from letting that stop you.
Digital performance analyses
Part of my charting process has become a digital analyses of how I did. This is the best thing ever.
Here is how it goes.
My main goal is mastering Structural Thinking consultancy and one of my sub goals to make that happen is ‘doing an x amount of practise in a year’.
So when I look at my current reality in relation to that goal I will do some actual counting. How many personal sessions, strategy sessions with entrepreneurs, digital decision making sessions, other efforts of studying and practising this field. Some years (or quarters) I have made my goal, and sometimes I haven’t. But part of studying current reality is not just counting, it is also going up in the air and seeing the bigger picture. And when I do that I can understand why I did not make my goal. And knowing the reason then makes me able to set a more doable, more realistic goal for the next quarter. And the ‘digital’ part is where I ask myself whether my actions moved me adequately (+) or inadequately (-) towards my goal. And whether I think it will get better (+), stay the same (0) or get worse (-). Quite often I get two plusses. Even when I did not make my goal. Because understanding that I managed to do x given the circumstances of y makes me see that it was actually adequate. And adequate is enough. Who needs perfection?
