“Every new beginning comes from some other beginning’s end” Seneca

A new year means new beginning and fresh starts, time to embrace a new perspective. It’s a perfect time to let go of the past, freeing yourself of what has been and embracing a new perspective – a fresh look at all of the wonderful possibilities ahead.

We all know about New Year’s resolutions and how short-lived they can be. This year, consider setting a long-term intention. In these challenging times, amidst the pandemic, climate disruption, calls for social and racial justice, and our own personal challenges, we can pause, quiet ourselves and dedicate ourselves to our best intentions. Setting a long-term intention is like setting the compass of our own personal vision for the individual we strive to be. No matter how rough the storms, how difficult the terrain, even if we have to backtrack around obstacles, our direction is clear. The fruits of dedication are visible in the best of our endeavors, every day is a new day of opportunity.

I was reading over the holiday season, and a blog from Ryan Holiday struck me as interesting, titled “The Perfect Day Begins with a Good Evening”. Holiday mentions that all the talk about morning routines makes it easy to overlook that a good morning is impossible without a good evening.

To the Stoics, every day was to be lived as if it closed the story, every night ended as if it was the last night we had. They’re right. How we close out the day matters. The decisions we make. The reflection we encourage. The time we drift off to sleep. All of it is about finishing well…because then and only then can we start tomorrow better too. This is something that I plan to incorporate into my own vision of the year ahead, focus not only on owning the morning, but setting up for the day ahead, each day a new beginning.

“Let us go to our sleep with joy and gladness.” Seneca

So what does a good evening routine look like?

• Make Time For Leisure
• Enjoy A Philosophical Dinner
• Go For A Walk
• Tuck The Kids In
• Review The Day
• Go To Bed At A Set Time
• Start Again

For me, review the day is a perfect opportunity to reflect on our day and time spent. Holiday mentions that Winston Churchill was famously afraid of going to bed at the end of the day having not created, written or done anything that moved his life forward. “Every night,” he wrote, “I try myself by Court Martial to see if I have done anything effective during the day. I don’t mean just pawing the ground, anyone can go through the motions, but something really effective.”

In a letter to his older brother Novatus, Seneca describes the exercise he borrowed from another prominent philosopher.

“When the light has been removed and my wife has fallen silent,” Seneca wrote, “I examine my entire day and go back over what I’ve done and said, hiding nothing from myself, passing nothing by.”

Success and happiness require self-awareness and self-reflection……it’s important we notice what contributed to our happiness and what detracted from it. Writing, analyzing, reflecting, taking inventory of how you spent the day….this is how you continue improving. A good evening routine is just priming us to have a great day….there is still work to be done when we wake up and for us to own the morning. Well-begun is half done, as they say.

As you begin the New Year, take some time to sit and quietly reflect. If today you were to set or reaffirm a long-term intention, a vision, your direction for what will be….what would it be and now let us welcome the New Year, full of things that have never been – your journey is full of opportunity and the beginning is always today and it’s the most important part of the work.

It’s never too late to be what you might have been George Eliot

Be well & enjoy the moments

Derek