Making Space for Year-End Reflections

By Christine Murray

The end of 2024 will be here in one week. When one year ends and another begins, we have an opportunity to reflect on the year behind us and what we hope for the next year to come. In this week’s Pathway for Survivors Blog post, I’m going to share some thoughts on the importance of making space for year-end reflections, especially for those of us along the journey of healing from past abuse. Next week, my post will focus on taking a look ahead as 2025 gets underway.

If it would be helpful to you, I invite you to create some space in your life during the last days of 2024 to reflect on your experiences this past year. Creating space for reflection might look like spending time journaling, talking with a counselor or trusted friend, or even just going for a long walk and spending time with your thoughts and emotions. 

Making space for reflection is a valuable practice for survivors of abusive relationships. In fact, I believe reflection is such an important part of the healing journey that I included it as one of the 6 Commitments in the Pathway for Supporting Survivors Model. As I shared in that original blog post:

Some of the steps you’ll take as you work on your healing from past abuse will have amazing results! They will help you grow, overcome limiting beliefs, connect with social support, and/or feel stronger. However, there will be other steps you’ll attempt that don’t feel like they help you very much, and sometimes you may even feel like they set you back. All of this is part of the complicated journey of recovering from past abuse. Because this journey can be so complex, it is wise to put mechanisms in place to help you make time for regular reflection so you can figure out what is working well, what you may want to modify, and what you may want to stop doing altogether. Self-reflection (often aided by trusted people in your support network as well) is a valuable tool along the pathway of recovering from past abuse.

We can engage in self-reflection at any time of the year, and it can be helpful to set aside regular time for reflection, such as once a month or once a week. However, the end of a year can be an especially powerful time for self-reflection. There’s something concrete about a full calendar year ending that offers a useful timeline for reflecting back on all of our experiences during the year. This includes the ups and downs, the highs and lows, and even the so-so times we may have even forgotten!

Below are some questions that may be useful if you’d like to use the end of the year as a time for self-reflection:

• What am I most proud of myself during 2024?
• What is my favorite memory of 2024?
• What were the biggest challenges I faced in 2024? If I could go back in time, is there anything I would do differently in terms of how I navigated these challenges?
• Are there any big frustrations or disappointments I’m facing as this year is ending? What, if anything, did I hope would happen this year, but didn’t? 
• What did I learn about the relationships in my life this year? Who were my biggest supporters? Which relationships challenged me the most? Were there boundaries I had to set - or wish that I had set - to protect my energy from potentially hurtful relationships?
• In what ways can I see that I have grown personally throughout 2024?
• What were the most significant emotions that I experienced this year? Did I allow myself to experience and process these emotions in healthy ways?
• What, if any, milestones did I reach along my healing journey as a survivor?
• What can I learn from my experiences in 2024 that can help me think about possible adjustments I may want to make as I go into 2025?

It’s possible that you’ll experience strong emotions as you reflect on this past year. Remember to practice self-soothing strategies and continue to develop emotion-regulation skills as you process these emotions. Consider reaching out for support from a mental health professional if you think it would help to discuss these experiences or emotions with a trained professional. 

Personally, 2024 has been a pretty wild ride for me! There have been some very positive changes - including starting a new job and, of course, launching The Source for Survivors back in January. On the other hand, I’ve also faced some challenges and lots of stress, both in my work and in my personal life. As I reflect on my own experiences in 2024, there are some things I sort of wish I could go back and change, but I also can appreciate that even the hard times can become opportunities for new insights and personal growth.

If you carve out a little space for self-reflection as 2024 comes to a close, I hope you will discover that you gained new strength this year, even if that strength was hard-earned through some challenging times. I also hope that you will reflect on your progress and growth along your healing journey. The healing journey is not an easy, linear path, so your progress may look like a few steps forward, a few back, and perhaps even a few that felt like you were going sideways or spinning in circles!

I wish you the best for a calm, restorative end to this year, and I thank you for being a part of the Source for Survivors community!