Episode 44: 2 Exercises To Close Out The Year And Start Fresh In The New Year
Full Transcript:
Welcome to the Upgraded Leader Podcast, where we talk about all things, managing up, building relationships, leading our team's personal branding, setting goals, setting boundaries, and succeeding in our careers on our terms. I'm your host Nicole Case, and today we are talking about two powerful exercises to close out the year and start fresh in the new year.
[00:00:19] Of course, you can do these things anytime of year, but if you are listening to this episode when it gets released on January 2nd. This could be a really nice time. So I think we can all agree that last year was a wild ride. I know I had an overall really great year, but it definitely wasn't without, without its ups and downs.
[00:00:37] It was, it was really a roller coaster actually, and I know that a lot of my clients felt the same way. I host a monthly meetup with my current and past clients where I do a little bit of training on a particular topic, and then we have a group discussion about it. And last month we were talking about just reflecting on the last year, what went well, what didn't, and the conversation went quickly to the hardest parts of the year.
[00:01:02] And isn't that typical, right? We always go straight to bad stuff, but there really was a lot of shit last year, and a lot of my clients shared . On that call, they shared about some really toxic workplaces that they were in, getting laid off and just real shit bosses. Just, it was, it was, um, it was a really awesome call and I, and I loved that the women that were there were able to just really create that safe space for, for people to share, just kind of how they were feeling, what their experiences were, and really just to.
[00:01:35] To know that they were not alone, that they were not the only ones that were experiencing these things.
[00:01:41] And no matter what you say, it might be business, but it's still very, very personal. I always think back to the movie, you've got mail where Meg Ryan's character says, you know, it might've just been business to you, but I. Shouldn't business be, if anything, business is personal. 'cause it was personal to me, and I totally agree with that.
[00:02:02] Like you spend so much time at work, you give so much of yourself because you want to love what you do. You want to use your strengths every day, like you're really pouring . So much of yourself into work, and, and honestly, I don't think that's a bad thing. I mean, there can be, we can have a whole conversation around our identity at work and I've certainly had had some people on the podcast to talk about that, but I think that's normal and, and okay to a certain level, to, to pour yourself into your work, to be passionate about your work and to love your work.
[00:02:35] The risk of doing that as if, as in any relationship that you put yourself out there with, that you run the risk of getting hurt, and when you aren't having a good experience at work, or you thought it was gonna be one thing and it turned out to be completely the complete opposite, it can be really devastating.
[00:02:53] I remember. Finally landing my dream job thinking I've finally made it after all of my hard work only to be treated so poorly and so disrespected, and just the job was just not what I thought it was going to be at all, and I was truly heartbroken. And if you've felt this in the past. You know, the feeling that you're, you're feeling there is really grief, right?
[00:03:18] Like you're sad that things didn't turn out the way that you wanted, or you're feeling a loss of your identity or a loss of your confidence, and, and that was the biggest one for me. My confidence was completely shattered. I was questioning everything during and immediately after that experience because I was blaming myself for letting it happen.
[00:03:39] Not seeing the red flags or. I don't know, just doing something differently. I don't know. But it just, I was really, really blaming myself and really upset, and again, it like completely just shattered my confidence and it took me a long time to really get that back. And it was also impacting my physical health as well.
[00:03:58] And I know so many of you can really. Relate to that, that you end up experiencing some really major physical issues with your health because, um, at the root root of it, it's, you know, this toxic workplace or the stress that you're experiencing, whether it's in your life or work or wherever, it can really impact our bodies.
[00:04:19] So I did an exercise to help me heal and move forward, and now it's one that I recommend to others. And I've been, actually, I can think back, even being a teenager and I. Writing, doing this exercise even as a teenager and just seeing how it's helped, and I've done it multiple times over my life, but the last time I did something like this was right after, right after this terrible work experience I.
[00:04:45] And now I also recommend others to do this as well. And this is what I like to call just writing a grief letter. It's literally taking out a piece of paper and writing a letter to that experience or writing a letter to the last year so you could get out a piece of paper and just say, dear 2023, I'm so fucking pissed at you and I'm glad that you're gone because I thought you were gonna be like this.
[00:05:07] And I had so much hope at the beginning of the year, but . This is the shit that you threw at me instead. And you just kind of continue to, to go on about what happened last year. Um, and you know how it didn't turn out the way that you wanted and all just the crap that you had to deal with, right? Just get it all out.
[00:05:23] I mean, or if it's not to last year, you could certainly write the letter to Dear Company , or Dear Old Boss's name, you know, whatever it is, whatever the situation was. You know, like name it, like seriously, like, dear whatever, and, and actually name it. And then . Get it all out there on paper without judgment, without filtering yourself, because no one's gonna read it except for you.
[00:05:47] So, and you're certainly not gonna send it. So get it all out. Get it all out. Get out all of those raw emotions out of your head, get it out of your heart and down on paper where they can't control you anymore.
[00:05:59] Because that's what's happening. These emotions are continuing to fester. They're continuing to stew and like you, you feel like you can't. Somehow dig yourself out of these emotions. And I'm not saying that we're trying to avoid the emotions or anything like that actually, by writing this letter and really getting them out and then like rereading the letter back to yourself, it's allowing you to sit with the emotions, truly feel them, but in a really controlled way, right?
[00:06:29] So they're not controlling you, you're controlling it, you're controlling what's getting out and putting, putting down on paper. And I just find that it just can be really . Um, just really therapeutic to, to really get this out again, because if you are continuing to harbor these feelings, continuing to keep them in your head and in your heart, even if you've been, you know, bitching a moan about it all throughout the year, which you might have, um, you know, just because you've said it out loud to someone else, that certainly can be helpful.
[00:06:57] But sometimes just having a private space like this to hand write how you were feeling and the experience can just really feel like a great release. And then by the end of the letter, you might feel ready to also thank the experience for what it taught you, um, you know, for putting it, for putting you into a position to
[00:07:21] You know, strengthen a different muscle or to be stretched in a way that you didn't, um, you didn't expect or to be open to an opportunity you would not have otherwise considered before. Um, so one of my clients that had shared on that call that night had had talked about, um, how she's now, um, interviewing for a, a different position That sounds absolutely amazing, but in an industry that she would've never, ever considered before.
[00:07:47] So. You know, this could certainly be an amazing pivot in her career that she would've never, ever gotten herself to, had it not been for this really terrible experience that she unfortunately had to go through first. And if you aren't ready in that moment, , when you, when you're writing this letter, that's okay.
[00:08:05] Um, maybe you write a second letter at another time when you are in a better space to reflect on the lessons learned. So it could be all in one letter. Where you kind of get out all of your feelings and just kind of what happened and then you, and then you get to the end and you feel like, yeah, I can say also thank you for this experience 'cause this is what I learned and this is what's gonna happen moving forward.
[00:08:26] But again, you might not be in that space. At that moment, and that's okay. So maybe it's a, maybe this is a two part exercise and that's okay too. And then when you're done with the letter, this is my favorite part, when you're done with the letter, you rip it up, you burn it, you flush it down the toilet, whatever it is that you need to do to just kind of close out that.
[00:08:44] Experience. So that's the first exercise, especially if, um, again, maybe the last year didn't turn out the way that you were hoping to, maybe you didn't achieve the goals that you were, that you had, you had planned to, that you had set out to, and you don't have to obviously, have a really dramatic experience to write a letter like this, right?
[00:09:03] You don't have, it doesn't have to be some big, terrible, traumatic thing that you experienced last year or in a job or whatever in order to feel. To really feel a release or really feel complete after writing this letter. So that's the first exercise. The second exercise is another letter, but it's a letter to the future you, one year from now, I do this every single year on New Year's, and I've, I've been doing it, oh God, I can't even tell you how many years now.
[00:09:33] Probably six or so. And, um, and I, again, I do this every, every year on New Year's. And in it, I tell myself everything in that year that I did, it's kind of like a vision casting manifestation. Exercise. Right? So again, so if, if we're using this year as an example, you would say, you know, dear, you know, dear Nicole, January 1st, 2025, this year I did all of these things.
[00:10:02] This is all the amazing experiences that I had, and this is how I felt during that time. And this is how amazing and awesome it was. And then the, and the point is then that you would read it back to yourself the following year to see what actually happened. So on January 1st, 2025, I'm gonna read that letter that I wrote to myself and just kinda remind myself the, you know, the headspace that I was in and all the things that, um, that I had planned on, and to see what actually happened.
[00:10:32] And you know, if this is just too woowoo for you, you can just think about it as declaring what it is that you're going to do next year. And again, you're gonna read that letter back, you know, one year from now or whatever time period. It doesn't have to be one year. It could be whatever time period you, you set for it.
[00:10:47] But then you read that. Back to yourself afterwards and again, actually see what happened. It's amazing how accurate this can actually end up being. And a great example of this is when I wrote my letter to myself on December 31st, 2019. And in that letter I said a lot of things in that letter I usually go on for a couple of pages.
[00:11:08] Obviously, you, you make it as long as as you want it to be or as long as it needs to be. And in it, one of the very specific things that I talked about in that letter was that, you know, so proud of you. You know, you made this amount of money in your business in 2020, and of course we know how much of a shit show 2020 ended up being that nobody could have predicted.
[00:11:30] But it was so interesting reading that letter back to myself on like January 1st, 2021. And the amazing thing was I did not make that amount of money in my business. Nowhere even close did I make that amount of money that I had the goal. That was the goal in what I said I was going to do. But what did happen in 2020 was that I quit my, I quit my job and I went full-time in my business.
[00:11:54] And what I realized was that was really the intention of that financial goal. That was really what it was about, was to make that amount of money to prove to myself that I could do it, so that I could go full-time in my, in my coaching business. So I ended up achieving the bigger goal of going full-time and proving to myself that I could do it even without that tangible dollar amount.
[00:12:17] To validate it. It was just so cool. And I have so many other examples, uh, over the years of me writing these letters and seeing what actually transpired. There's just something again about really casting that vision out there and just declaring to the universe that this is what I'm gonna do this year.
[00:12:36] And this exercise is meant to be full of hope and positivity and optimism for the year to come. And I personally like to end this letter the same way every year. Again, this is me. You don't have to do it this way, but I like to end the letter with, I am so proud of you because who else do you need validation from?
[00:12:59] But yourself. I know a lot of times we set goals to please other people or for other people to be impressed by us or whatever, but at the end of the day, if we aren't proud of ourselves, then what was this all meant to be about? And I don't know about you, but if you had didn't hear, you know, I'm so proud of you a lot growing up, you know, this could be a really, really powerful.
[00:13:23] Way to end this letter. And again, you know, so if it's, if it's not that, maybe it's something else, you know, figure out something else that would be incredibly impactful for you to hear from yourself. So these were the two simple exercises that you can do to close out last year and move forward in the new year.
[00:13:43] And if you want more detailed information on my upgraded goal setting process, I've actually curated all of my past goal setting episodes into one page with links out to all of your favorite podcast players. . Plus the upgraded goal setting workbook. Again, all in one place for you to download. So you can check that out@theupgradedleader.com slash goal setting.
[00:14:07] And it's all out there for you if you want a more structured way to go through your goal setting process this year.
[00:14:13] I hope you found this quickie episode helpful, and I'll see you in the next one. But in the re meantime, remember, your career deserves an upgrade.
