A sympathetic review of 2020

Goodbye 2020 – hello 2021!

2020 is coming to an end. For many of us, it was a turbulent year, characterised by uncertainty, adjustments and stress. Are you looking forward to being able to leave all that behind you? If so, you are definitely not alone.
As well as the bad times, the uncertainty and maybe the fear, the last twelve months have undoubtedly contained many beautiful, exciting and memorable moments. Do any of them leap to mind?
Maybe this year you find it harder to recall your positive memories, but precisely because 2020 was a difficult year that challenged us all, it’s worth looking back on the good times.

A positive review of the year

Many things can happen in twelve months. Every day looks a bit different and yet all the events merge into each other over time, so that it’s hard to capture all the impressions of these 365 days. Pausing and taking the necessary time to review the year will make the events of the last twelve months more tangible. We can learn from what we have experienced, draw new inspiration, celebrate milestones and re-live happy moments. To devote yourself to your review of the year in peace, you should take a couple of uninterrupted hours. The simplest way of remembering the last twelve months is to run through the year chronologically and search for the most meaningful experiences month by month.


"Memories live longer than things.”
- James Wallman -


In the beginning, you will maybe only remember the negatives. This is normal, because people are liable to what is known as a negativity bias. This bias describes a mental dis-tortion in which negative information is more heavily weighted than positive. From the evolutionary perspective, this distortion is useful, as people can recognise dangers more quickly as a result. Since, in this day and age, we are not usually exposed to life-threatening dangers, this bias can also be counteracted somewhat. One way of doing this is practising mindfulness. The more you practise seeing the positives, the more balanced your perception will become. So be a little patient and search actively for the positive experiences. As soon as you have remembered a few, some more happy memories will certainly come to mind. You can use photos, souvenirs or your diary to help you.

Visualise your gratitude

After you have taken the time to do a mental review of the past year, you should put these memories down onto paper. Writing by hand has several advantages. One of them is that you deal with the content in greater depth when you write. You re-experience the positive feelings when you are considering pleasant experiences, and your mood will begin to improve. You can find more advantages in our article on journaling.

Inducing such positive emotions is the crux of positive psychology. This science investigates the question of what makes life worth living and deals with the conditions that promote human wellbeing. Exercising gratitude is a particularly successful part of positive psychology. To do this, you should regularly write down the things you are grateful for. If this exercise is practised regularly, you will observe increasing optimism, greater life satisfaction and a positive, grateful mood, because all of these qualities have been kick-started. Write down at least three things that you were particularly grateful for over the last year. If you think of more, so much the better!

If you like, you can suggest to your nearest and dearest that they do the gratitude exercise too. You could talk about it the next time you meet, or on Zoom, because the saying “a joy shared is a joy doubled” is scientifically proven.

Getting rid of burdens, keeping good things, starting new things

Typically, a review of the year goes hand-in-hand with setting good intentions. The new year is a good opportunity to pursue new intentions per se. A fresh start will maybe give you the little push that was missing before. Yet after only a little time, most of us already find it difficult to pursue these goals with commitment. To support you in achieving your intentions, all our news articles in January 2021 will be about setting goals and changing behaviour.

So that you can start with us in January, it makes sense if you give yourself some feedback in advance. The “Stop, Start, Continue” method is a good way of doing this. Here is a template we have created for you.

  • Stop
    Under this heading, you can write down the things you want to leave behind and that should remain in 2020. To do this, you can ask yourself the following questions: What do you worry about too much? In what ways do you spend too much time on things that are not your priority?
  • Start
    This heading is for everything you would like to tackle a new in the coming year. The questions that could help you here are: What would you like to achieve within one year? Will this goal improve your everyday life? What will be different when you have achieved this goal, and do you want that? Do your short-term efforts match these long-term goals?
  • Continue
    Here you can write down the things you are proud of and the things that you want to keep on doing in the next year. Ask yourself these questions: What did you do well this year? What are you proud of? What would you like to continue working on?


“The best thing about the future is that it comes one day at a time.”
- Abraham Lincoln -


We look forward to seeing you here again in the New Year and we wish you a Happy New 2021!

 

References:
Emmons, R. A., & McCullough, M. E. (2003). Counting blessings versus burdens: An experimental investigation of gratitude and subjective well-being in daily life. Journal of Personality and Social Psychology, 84(2), 377–389.
Gable, R. (2004). What Do You Do When Things Go Right? The Intrapersonal and Interpersonal Benefits of Sharing Positive Events. Journal of Personality and Social Psychology, 87(2), 228–245.
Kiken, L. G., & Shook, N. J. (2011). Looking Up: Mindfulness Increases Positive Judgments and Reduces Negativity Bias. Social Psychological and Personality Science, 2(4), 425–431.
Leah R. Dickens (2017): Using Gratitude to Promote Positive Change: A Series of Meta-Analyses Investigating the Effectiveness of Gratitude Interventions, Basic and Applied Social Psychology.
Spenst, D. (2017). The 6-Minute Diary

This might also interest you:

08. September 2022

New parents

19. Januar 2021

Goals

11. Januar 2021

365 fresh chances