Everyone begins the year with a set of goals and resolutions; however, being a skeptic, I prefer to begin with retrospection and postpone the goal setting exercise. Over the years, I have realised that goal setting exercises with high levels of endorphins and ethanol in bloodstream do not turn out to be fruitful in the long run. Moreover, subsequent goals should not only include the lessons learned but also contain sufficient substance and connect with the past. And this requires careful retrospection of the journey so far!
Although many people retrospect on a daily basis either while meditating or day dreaming, certain goals and initiatives cannot be retrospected on shorter timeframes spanning days or weeks. In such case, you need to wait for long term trends to emerge. This zoomed out graph over a longer time horizon is required to retrospect many aspects. In other words, you need to allow sufficient timeframe for these initiatives, before you can declare results. For instance, daily retrospection of your tennis match makes sense, whereas the same frequency for stock portfolio performance will only cause anxiety.
Moreover, high frequency retrospection for initiatives that require longer timeframes to yield any results can be counter productive. Although this is a topic for another blog, summarising in brief, such frequent retrospection will induce anxiety leading to indulgence and unwanted corrections that can result in a charred barbecue.
While for many others like myself, who fail to retrospect through daily meditation, occasions such as new year offer an opportunity to step out of the hamster wheel and observe your life with a wider and different perspective. The rat race, or the hamster wheel, of our routine humdrum can be too overwhelming to step out.
But what necessitates retrospection is the fact that being oblivious to the realities propelling the outcome leads to a disconnect. Whether success or failure, it is necessary to comprehend the facts. And the facts can neither be unraveled nor subsequently integrated into your decision making without retrospection. Since new goals should not only to build upon the past but also glean over the learnings, careful retrospection becomes indispensable.
The highs of success can be delusional whereas the lows of failure can be disheartening. In the former scenario, rather than being over confident about your abilities, you should understand the decisions and work, along with the contributing factors, that propelled your success. Similarly in the later scenario, rather than doubting your abilities, you should analyse the decisions and gaps, along with the factors beyond your control, that led to your failure.
This is the time to take ownership of the outcome and accept all underlying reasons. It might be easy to blame your failure on luck [uncontrollable factors], but it is equally difficult to attribute your success to luck [extremely favourable situations]. And this is because it is extremely difficult for anyone to digest their lack of abilities. Such level of acceptance is impossible with high levels of adrenaline.
And retrospection provides with the mental space to own the results and reasons. Once you establish the connect with past, and unravel the reasons for results, you are better equipped to set your goals for the upcoming year; as you are more familiar with your blind spots and avenues for improvement. Although goals are usually about marching orders, retrospection is necessary to decide the direction and momentum.
Look back before plan your leap ahead!
Pat Snyder
And if you are planning your business or start-up in 2022, make sure that you get this course on Business Management Fundamentals.
Header Image Photo by Hunter James on Unsplash
Savvy Munshi 