Most people go their *entire* life without reflecting

Most people go their *entire* life without reflecting.

And before they know it, they've wasted decades and it's too late to change.

To avoid this fate, I created the Monthly Review.

Grab a pen, crack open your notebook, and answer these 5 questions:

Your monthly reflection:

1. What were my biggest wins?
2. What were my biggest realizations?
3. What areas am I most satisfied? Least satisfied?
4. What am I going to do more of this month? Less of?
5. What am I thinking about for the upcoming month?

Let's explore these:

The goal of the monthly review:

Block 60 minutes to slowly process the month.

It's easy to get caught up in the day to day & lose sight of the bigger picture.

And after trying 1000+ reflection questions, I chose each question for a specific reason.

Let's start with the first:

1. What were my biggest wins & milestones?

These are things that you will look back on with pride & fond memories at the end of the year.

• Health wins
• Business wins
• New relationships
• Goals accomplished
• Fun memories & events

Here's why you start with this one:

Recapping wins & milestones kicks the review off on a positive note.

So often, our focus is on the negative.

But this questions helps us celebrate all the things going well!

And it also creates a "ledger" of wins from the year.

From there, you ask a more important question:

2. What were my biggest realizations?

I used to call this my "biggest losses."

But I reframed this—because something is either a win, or it teaches you about the world.

And by constantly collecting these realizations, you are always learning.

Here are some examples:

Most of my realizations are about my:

• Health
• Beliefs
• Business
• Lack of skills
• Relationships

By constantly iterating and distilling these lessons, you will level up month after month after month.

From here, you go from looking backward to looking at the present:

3. What areas am I most satisfied? Least satisfied?

Split the page in 2 columns and brain dump bullet points of everything that comes to mind.

The goal here is to identify in the present moment what's working and what's not working.

From there, you ask another question:

4. Based on these areas, what am I going to do more of? Less of?

This is the 80/20 rule in action.

20% of your:

• Habits
• Beliefs
• Friends
• Actions

Are leading to 80% of both your positive *and* negative results.

And the goal here is to identify them, so you can do this:

Now you should have 2 lists:

• Things to *double down* on that are bringing you the positive results

• Things to *stop doing entirely* that are bringing you the negative results

Put those lists somewhere you can see them every morning (for me, that's on my bathroom mirror).

Alrighty—you started reflecting on the prior 30 days.

Then you reflected on the present.

Now, it's time to think about the future.

Which brings us to your final question:

5. What am I thinking about for the month ahead?

This is a quick list of things you're:

• Excited about
• Thinking about
• Uncertain about

This turns into a letter to your future self you can read at the end of the month.

And just like that, the review is complete!

The beauty of this process is you can constantly capture these things throughout the month.

• Wins & milestones
• Realizations & decisions
• Things going well & things to improve

Then, at the end of the year, you collect these monthly reviews and distill the entire year!

To recap, reflect on these questions every month:

Thanks for reading!

If you found these prompts useful, follow me @dickiebush for more posts on personal progress.

Then jump back up to the top and repost the thread (so we can share these prompts with more people):

Dickie Bush 🚢 @dickiebush

Most people go their *entire* life without reflecting.

And before they know it, they've wasted decades and it's too late to change.

To avoid this fate, I created the Monthly Review.

Grab a pen, crack open your notebook, and answer these 5 questions: