2021: A Year in Review
The past few years have been full of ups and downs, as I’m sure it has for most people. Prior to the pandemic, I was slowly feeling less motivated and less energy. I wasn’t sure why, but I felt like I lacked engagement in my life. Once the pandemic hit, those motivation and energy levels took a nosedive. I know a lot of people have that “just getting through the day” feeling, but since I was starting to feel this way before the pandemic, I know that I really need to turn things around.
The other day, I posted about my Weekly Review. This review rated my life in 10 different areas on what I call the Wheel of Life (download here). I mentioned in that post that I had done this review almost every week of 2021.
In this post I will discuss my findings around the averages for my year. My goal is to improve these averages, so this will serve as the benchmark for my end of the year.
I used Excel Online to create a spreadsheet of my ratings:
And used the AVERAGE function to find the year’s average in each area:
My final averages for the year 2021 were:
Getting an average of 44 out of 100 is eye opening. I’m not even half as happy as I could be? Great Scott! In order to get a better idea of the cause of these scores, I took a look at the overall highs and lows from each area. Here are my results:
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Highs: We went on some fun outings as a family in 2021, including flying to see our favorite NFL team in action!
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Lows: Need to do more as a family so we can have fun together when the kids are older.
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2. Career – Score: 5.15
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Highs: Working from home has been great. I have been learning a new tech space and feeling good.
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Lows: I lost steam in keeping up with my learning and growth and feel stagnant.
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3. Contributions/Giving – Score: 2.13
Highs: We do well with this during the Christmas season.
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Highs: We do well with this during the Christmas season.
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Lows: Need to do more during the non-holiday time. I’d like to involve the kids more.
4. Spirituality – Score: 2.0
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Highs: Added more meditation to my daily rituals.
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Lows: Really need a lot of work here. Not even sure where to begin.
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5. Finances – Score: 6.23
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Highs: Did fine with this area. Read The Automatic Millionaire and implemented one of his suggestions.
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Lows: Would like to implement more of the suggestions and also read The Money Makeover and Rich Dad, Poor Dad. I have always wanted to create and track a budget so this is also on the list.
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6. Relationship – Score: 4.23
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Highs: We had some fun times this year and spent a lot of time together.
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Lows: We need more date nights and have struggled with the pandemic causing issues with us getting a babysitter.
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7. Environment – Score: 4.27
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Highs: Ugh. This one is tough to find a positive for, but I have kept up on my cleaning system better.
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Lows: Needs lots of work. House feels messy and full and busy.
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8. Family – Score: 6
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Highs: Spent a lot of time together due to the pandemic and found us growing closer as a family.
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Lows: Spent a lot of time together due to the pandemic and didn’t see enough of extended family.
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9. Personal Development – Score: 4
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Highs: Read a lot of books and actively took notes and made action plans.
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Lows: Still not following through on a lot of the good information I’m reading. Feel like I’m “forgetting”.
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10. Health – Score: 5
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Highs: Worked out 6 days a week every week. Didn’t miss a week at all, only took Sundays as rest days. Feeling good. Started RUNNING and absolutely love it (even completed my first official 5K!) Also started Intermittent Fasting in April and it’s been fine but may need to switch it up.
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Lows: Need to determine if I want to continue with Intermittent Fasting. I also have some goals on the muscle I want to build and I would like to run a 5K in under 30 minutes (I think I was at 33 minutes in the 5K I ran this summer).
Seeing these (terrible) scores for my life in the last year, I’m ready to make some improvements. The only thing that consistently has helped me feel better is ACTION. Getting up, doing what I know I need to do, staying away from social media scrolling, and keeping busy. I know that having goals and action plans keeps me feeling motivated, and now it’s time to focus on improvements.
My goal for 2022 is to do this same analysis at the end of the year and to see the averages improve for every area.
What would your Year in Review look like? How are those areas doing?