Year-End Inventory & Reflection (3 Min Read) | Vol. 182

December 19, 2025

“Follow effective action with quiet reflection. From the quiet reflection will come even more effective action.” – Peter Drucker

Year-End Inventory & Reflection

For the past three years, I’ve shared year-end reflection questions here.* But I’ve skipped an important step. If you want to set better goals for next year, reflect on this year. If you want to have a more meaningful reflection, take inventory. 

Taking inventory primes your reflection process and helps you avoid the recency bias. We tend to overemphasize the importance of recent events. And, frankly, for busy people it feels like a decade has passed since February. We forget a lot. Here are two helpful inventory practices we use in our coaching and training:

1. Calendar Review
Open your calendar, go back to January 1st, and start scrolling forward. You’re taking inventory for both your highs and lows. As you work your way through the year, take note of the big and noteworthy events. If you primarily use Google or Outlook, select the weekly or monthly view from your desktop or laptop. This is next to impossible on your phone. For the most ambitious out there, you can export your calendar and analyze your year with AI. (I will share my prompt in the workbook below.)

One of the reasons I love my The ONE Thing Planner is how easy it is to flip down memory lane. When planning my goals, I only include my big rocks – travel, birthdays, anniversaries, writing days, speaking gigs, etc. So it’s already been filtered for the noise. Those weekly team meetings? M’eh. That weekend trip to meet your new nephew? Huzzah! 

2. Photo Review 
We’ve also found that many people don’t document their personal livesfe on their calendars. So open your phone’s photo app and use search to identify all your photos for the year. (For example, for 2025, just search 2025 and your photo app should identify all the snaps you’ve taken that year.) 

Then, start scrolling. Just as you did with your calendar, take note of the photos that make you smile or tug at your heart. I find there are lots of “little memories” that are as memorable as the big events. That morning walk you took with an old friend visiting from out of town or theat evening a screech owl landed on your back fence. 

When we do this exercise in classes, the energy in the room shifts. Sometimes, we see tears shed, and other times we hear quiet chuckles.

Once you’ve reviewed your calendar and photos, you should have a pretty thorough inventory of your year. Now, you’re primed to journal on the Nine Year-End Reflection Questions. I got tired of recreating this process and built this 20-page workbook. You can download it here.

One question to ponder in your thinking time: What lessons from this year can I use to improve next year? 

Make an Impact!
Jay Papasan
Co-author of The ONE Thing, The Millionaire Real Estate Agent & author of The Rookie Real Estate Agent

* If you want to check out previous year-end reflection posts, here’s some helpful links: 2022, 2023, and 2024.