End of Year Reflection Questions: 40 Prompts to Close the Year

The short version. Set aside thirty minutes in the last weeks of December, pick ten of the questions below and answer them in writing. Spend most of the time on what happened and what it taught you, and a little on what you want next. Then put the answers somewhere they will find you again in a year, because rereading them next December is where most of the value is.

Why reflect at the end of the year?

A year is long enough for real change and short enough to remember. Its end works as a natural pause: in studies of the fresh start effect, researchers found that dates which mark a new chapter, such as New Year, make people more likely to look at their goals and act on them. Writing adds something of its own. James Pennebaker’s research on expressive writing found that putting experiences into words helps people make sense of them, and a study by Robert Emmons and Michael McCullough linked writing down what went well with better wellbeing.

The questions do the remembering for you. Without them most people recall the last six weeks and a couple of big events, and the rest of the year fades.

How to do it in 30 minutes

1. Scroll through your calendar and photos month by month, starting in January (five minutes).
2. Pick ten questions: five about the year, two lessons, one about people and two about next year.
3. Answer in full sentences, by hand or typed. Specific beats impressive.
4. Underline the one answer that surprised you most.
5. Date the page and put it where you will find it again next December.

Looking back: 12 questions about the year

• What three words describe this year?
• What are you proudest of, even if nobody saw it?
• What was the best day of the year, and what made it good?
• What was the hardest moment, and how did you get through it?
• Who did you spend the most time with, and did that feel right?
• What did you start this year that you want to keep?
• What did you stop doing, and do you miss it?
• What did you spend money on that was worth every cent?
• Which conversation changed something for you?
• What surprised you about yourself?
• Where did you feel most like yourself?
• If someone had followed you all year, what would they say you cared about?

Lessons: 8 questions about what the year taught you

• What did you learn the hard way?
• What advice would you give yourself on 1 January of this year?
• What drained your energy again and again?
• What gave you energy back?
• Which worry turned out smaller than you feared?
• What are you ready to let go of?
• Who do you owe a thank you, and for what?
• What did you get right that you rarely give yourself credit for?

People: 6 questions about the people around you

• Who made this year better?
• Which friendship grew, and which one faded?
• Who would you like to see more of next year?
• Is there a moment with someone you would handle differently today?
• What did the people closest to you need from you this year?
• Who will you tell, this week, that they mattered?

Looking ahead: 14 questions for next year

• What would make next year a good year, in one sentence?
• What is the one thing you want to be different by next December?
• What will you say no to?
• What will you make more time for?
• Which habit, kept for twelve months, would change the most?
• What are you curious about?
• What do you want to learn?
• Where do you want to go?
• What would you try if the outcome did not matter?
• What is one small step you can take in the first week of January?
• Which worry do you want to put down?
• Who do you want to become?
• What do you hope next December’s you will say about this year?
• What question would you like to ask yourself in a year?

What to do with your answers

A page of answers is useful once and powerful twice. Read today, it helps you plan. Read next December, it shows how far you moved, which worries came to nothing and which hopes came true, and that is usually the part people find most moving. Research on future self-continuity by Hal Hershfield suggests that feeling connected to the person you will become goes along with better long-term choices, and a letter that reaches that person is a simple way to build the connection.

So put the answers where they will come back to you. A notebook works if you know where it will be in a year. You can also turn them into a New Year letter to your future self and schedule it. With timedrop.it you write it in the browser, add a photo or a voice note and pick a date such as 31 December next year. It is encrypted in your browser before upload and arrives by email on the day. A free account includes one letter a year.

With a partner, a family or a team

The same questions work in a group. Couples can each answer five and swap pages over dinner. Families can give children three easy ones: the best day of the year, something they learned and one thing they want to do next year. Teams can use the lessons for a short year-end review and keep the answers about next year for January planning.

For more prompts, see what to write in a letter to your future self and the five-minute future-self journaling practice.