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Takeaway

Most New Year's resolutions fail because they're built on wishful thinking, not systems. This guide changes that.

By the end of this review, you will:

  1. Know exactly where you stand — with an honest audit of your wins, mistakes, and scores across Health, Wealth, Relationships, Experiences, and Business.
  2. Identify the 20% driving 80% of your results — the few habits, people, and environments creating most of your progress (and most of your setbacks).
  3. Have a clear action plan — a prioritized "Start, Keep, Stop" list for each life area, plus a weekly tracker to stay accountable all year.

The goal isn't to do more. It's to do fewer things better — and build a system that makes next year your best year yet.

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Jesse Itzler’s Yearly Review

[https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=38fdOXcsN_g&t=7s](https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=38fdOXcsN_g&t=7s](https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=38fdOXcsN_g&t=7s](https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=38fdOXcsN_g&t=7s)

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The Big Idea: Stop letting life happen to you. Intentionally design your year around a few "Big Rocks" — the experiences and goals that matter most.

The 3-Step System:

  1. Close the Year — Acknowledge what happened (wins, losses, lessons) so you can move forward with a clean slate.
  2. Define Your Big Rocks — Pick your Misogi (one audacious challenge), Adventures (bucket-list experiences), and Health Goals for the year.
  3. Lock the Calendar — Schedule your Big Rocks first, before the year fills up with noise.

Best for: People who feel like years "just happen" and want to be more intentional about creating memorable, growth-oriented experiences.

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Tim Ferriss’s Past Year Review

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The Big Idea: Forget resolutions. Look backward at real data from your year to figure out what actually made you happy (and miserable) — then do more of the former and less of the latter.

The Process:

  1. Audit Your Calendar — Go week by week and note which moments were positive peaks (high energy, fulfillment, joy) and which were negative peaks (stress, dread, energy drains).
  2. 80/20 Analysis — Identify the 20% of activities, people, and habits driving 80% of your positive and negative experiences.
  3. Schedule the Positive — Put recurring time blocks on your calendar for high-ROI activities.
  4. Create a "Not-To-Do" List — Commit to eliminating or minimizing the biggest energy drains.

Best for: Analytical thinkers who want a data-driven approach and are willing to be ruthless about cutting what doesn't work.

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Yearly Review Template

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The Big Idea: This template combines the best of both frameworks above into a single, comprehensive 10-step system. It walks you through reflection, analysis, and action planning — so you leave with a concrete roadmap, not just good intentions.

The 10 Steps:

  1. Milestones — Map the inflection points of your year
  2. Wins — Celebrate what went right
  3. Organize by Theme — See your life's "matrix" across 5 areas
  4. Mistakes — Acknowledge what went wrong (no shame, just data)
  5. End-of-Year Audit — Score each life area objectively
  6. 80/20 Analysis — Find the few things driving most of your results
  7. Lessons — Distill insights into portable frameworks
  8. Start, Keep, Stop — Build an actionable plan for each life area
  9. Weekly Tracker — Stay accountable all year long
  10. Turn It Into Content — Share what you learned

Time required: 4–8 hours total (spread across multiple sessions)

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A couple quick “best practices” before we dive in:

  1. This reflection is not meant to be done in one sitting. When we did this review for ourselves, we blocked off 1-2 hours per “step” so we could give it our full attention.
  2. Feel free to mix, match, combine, remove, and make this review process your own. The Yearly Review is meant to be both 1) a template you can follow exactly and 2) an “outline” you can pull from when creating your own Yearly Review process.
  3. We copied our own life areas into this document (health, wealth, relationships, experiences, & business). Feel free to change things around to better align with the way you bucket your life!

Remember: Every year, you are on a mission to make next year your best year yet.

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