Wrapping Up & Moving On

I'm not a fan of resolutions - I've made them and then never follow through. I am a fan of learning from the past, growing from my mistakes and building upon my successes.

Last year I discovered an old post from Michael Hyatt that helped me wrap up the year so that it was a learning, growing and moving on experience. You can read his full post here - 7 Questions to Ask About Last Year. 

Here are the questions:

1. If the last year were a movie of your life, what would the genre be?
2. What were the two or three major themes that kept recurring? 
3. What did you accomplish this past year that you are the most proud of?
4. What do you feel you should have been acknowledged for but weren't?
5. What disappointments or regrets did you experience this past year?
6. What was missing from last year as you look back?
7. What were the major life-lessons you learned this past year?

Wrestling with these questions last year helped me put a framework around the year. It wasn't just a year of activities or busyness. There was meaning, purpose and mistakes I wish I could do over. Taking time to really think about my answers, I believe, helped me move into this year with greater purpose and focus. I've got so much more to learn. Just when I think I've got something by the tail, I find it's got me. I also discovered things weren't as bad as I might have made them out to be. Seeing answers in print made me not be so hard on myself. It certainly wasn't a perfect year but it wasn't a failure either. Taking some time to look back is helpful to learning, growing and moving on during the coming calendar year.

I encourage you to take a sabbath day. Spend some time thinking about the past year - what can you learn? - where can you grow? Now move on.

Resolutions don't work but this kind of exercise helped me make some goals. I was able to see more clearly how just a few minutes, a few tweaks to my schedule could make a huge difference. 

As I've considered my answers for 2012 I'm making adjusting some of my priorities. For instance:

• Reading each week that focuses on growing my leadership skills. I'm choosing to read, each week, an article from the Harvard Business Review (HBR) and capture 1 or 2 keys for raising my leadership to a new level.
• Scheduling new (meaning more) meetings with staff and lay leadership so that some mistakes on my part have less chance of happening again.
• Participating in a new small group that I think will help me in the areas I identified as missing or that I regret.
• Living more consistently in my strength of teaching.

What will you do to move forward in 2013 - to not repeat some mistakes of 2012 - to make an impact for His Kingdom?