Reflecting on Your Life

Reflecting on your life is an exercise in making your life better. I once read a study that stated, out of all the things people wish they would have done more, they wished they would have done more reflecting on their lives.

That is one of the best ways to live a wonderful life. To take the time to reflect on what has come before us, and how we arrived where we are at.

So why don’t more people do this? Are we really that strapped for time that we can’t spend some of it reflecting on our life and how we can make it better?

This is certainly a worthwhile exercise for all of us. As the holidays approach, I always like to sit down and take the time to reflect on my life. Here are just some of the ways that I do just that:

  1. Go over some of your journal entries in the past year and beyond. (If you don’t journal, I think you are missing out on a powerful tool to make your life better. Think about starting one today.)
  2. Pinpoint some of the major events that have happened in the past year. Have they made you a better person? In what ways have they affected you?
  3. Consider some of the friends you have made, and some of the friends you may have lost. Is this a good thing, a bad thing, or a neutral thing?
  4. Consider your time spent. Was it more with family and friends, or more with work? Was this a good change?
  5. Laugh at your mistakes. We all made plenty of mistakes in the past year. Have we laughed at them and moved on? Maybe more importantly, have we learned from them?
  6. Look at your goal achievement. Have you achieved the goals you set out for yourself in the past year? Have you improved your health or your career?
  7. Ask where you are at now. Are you in the place you want to be? Granted, there is always more work to do, but did you set realistic expectations of yourself? Once you set them, did you meet them?  Knowing where you are at right now will help you in deciding where you want to go in the future.

Reflecting on your life is neither a hard exercise nor a time consuming exercise. It is however, a very important exercise to practice if you want to improve your life. So as the holidays approach set aside some time to really reflect on your life and consider how blessed you really are…

10 thoughts on “Reflecting on Your Life”

  1. Hi Jeremy. great reminder about getting some perspective.

    I sometimes think most of us spend too much time on deciding mundane, unimportant things and not enough on the really essential things. How much time do I spend deciding which car/furniture/clothes/ _________ (fill in the blank) to buy compared to reflecting on where I am in life and where I want to go next on my life journey? You suggest some simple, but crucial questions. Great post. Ian

    Ian Peatey’s last blog post..Love in the time of technology

  2. This is a beautiful post, Jeremy. I think the reason people aren’t reflecting is because they don’t want to. Maybe a lot of people really don’t think they have the time to reflect, but I know there are people who choose not to reflect because they don’t want to look at or think about where they came from. Maybe they made bad choices. Maybe bad things happened to them that they couldn’t control. But something or several somethings haunts them in some way, and keeps them from making time to reflect. 😉

    Another Stumble-worthy post!

    *smiles*
    Michele

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  3. Jeremy,

    A great reminder that we all need to stop constantly moving at times, and pause to catch our breaths and take a look back and see how far we’ve come. All of the points to reflect on in this article are awesome, and I think if each one of us reflected on these from time to time, it would serve us well.

    Rahul’s last blog post..Free Up Mental Energy by Objectifying Your Demons

  4. I am glad you guys could appreciate this post. It came up through a discussion with a friend and I thought it was important to write about. This time of year is the time of year where I reflect a lot. I think it is a good tradition to start.Cheers,Jeremy

  5. Reflection is so important, Jeremy – thanks for bringing it up – and discussing what to reflect upon. Reflection really gives us an opportunity to see what’s good in our life, and where we can improve. But if we don’t do it, then we’re much more likely to just continue down the same path we were on – and that path might not be the best for us…. Great stuff!

    Lance’s last blog post..Ask…And You Shall Receive

  6. You hit the nail on the head with this one. Knowing what we need to do is one thing, but if we keep repeating the same mistakes over and over, we aren’t learning from our mistakes. Reflection gives me a chance to see where I went wrong and correct myself.

    LisaNewton’s last blog post..It’s Time to do the Laundry

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  8. I have looked into stories I wrote about my life long ago and thank God I am here now. Only when we need a break from the buzz of a work week or someone new pops up do we reflect or go into the ol head. These times will help you recognize your progress.

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