Five Decisions to Make Before the Year Ends

The gap between years is a natural pause—a moment to think before the next chapter begins. Here are five decisions worth making before the clock strikes midnight.

1. What Will You Stop Doing?

Addition is easy. Subtraction is where the real gains are.

What commitments drain you without payoff? What habits waste time? What subscriptions do you never use? What relationships take more than they give?

You can't add without subtracting. Your time and energy are finite. Decide what to let go.

2. What Do You Want to Be Different?

Not vague "be better" wishes. Specific changes you actually want.

If you could change one thing about your work, what would it be? About your health? Your relationships? Your finances?

Pick one per area at most. You can't change everything at once.

3. What Decision Have You Been Avoiding?

You know the one. The thing you keep thinking about but never resolve. The conversation you need to have. The choice you keep deferring.

Set a deadline to make it. Early January, perhaps. Stop carrying it into another year.

4. What Will You Commit To?

Not "try" or "hope to" or "want to." Commit.

What's one thing you'll do every day? Every week? What's one habit that, if you maintained it all year, would make a meaningful difference?

Decide now. The decision is the first step; the commitment makes it stick.

5. What Will You Accept?

Some things can't be changed. Some problems can't be solved. Some disappointments have to be lived with.

What have you been fighting that isn't going to change? What would it mean to accept it?

Acceptance isn't resignation. It's redirecting energy from futile battles to places where you can actually make a difference.

Making These Real

Write your answers down. Tell someone. Make them concrete.

Decisions made in your head dissolve quickly. Decisions made concrete last longer.

You don't have to figure everything out. Just these five things, as specifically as you can.

Then close the book on this year, and open the next one with more clarity than you'd have otherwise.