Before you write a single resolution this year, I want you to try something different.
It’s a ritual I’ve been doing for over a decade, and it’s completely changed how I move from one year into the next.
Here’s the thing: New Year’s resolutions don’t work. And I’m inviting you right now to trade yours in for something that will not only open your mind and your heart, but will powerfully clear the way for you to actually create what you want for the next 12 months.
Here’s why resolutions fall flat: we try to decide what we want to change without ever processing the year that just happened.
How can we know what shifts we need to make if we haven’t unpacked where we’ve been?
This ritual is different. My hope is that it helps you process the experiences of 2025, raise your awareness about the lessons learned, and release what no longer serves you as we move into the next twelve months.
Prefer the audio? Listen here.
Making Space for the Practice
Before we get into the lists, I want you to make a real date with yourself for this.
Put it on your calendar. Life gets busy, my friends, and it’s so easy for us to be like, “Fine, yes, I know I should, but I’m not going to.” Please make a date and put it on your calendar right now.
Every year, I do this ritual with my sisters and girlfriends because it’s so much more powerful and more fun to witness each other in the process.
You might want to set up a little zen den. Light a candle, grab a cozy blanket, and something warm to drink, or a glass of wine, whatever is your pleasure.
This is a gift you’re giving yourself as you close out this chapter and open the next one.
I’ve put everything you need in a free guide, including all the questions and space to write your answers. You can grab it here.
It’s time to begin with your first of four lists.
List One: Your Peak Experiences of 2025
Peak experiences can be good or bad, so we’re not just listing the highlights here.
Think back over the year. What were the most impactful moments? What really imprinted on you, and why? What were your biggest wins? The hardest things? The most surprising? What brought you the most joy? Is there anything you would have done differently?
These questions help us mine the year for meaning rather than just letting it blur into the next one.
List Two: Your Big Fat Brag List
Acknowledging and celebrating your strengths and accomplishments is healthy and uplifting, and most of us do not do it enough.
Even if your biggest accomplishment was literally holding yourself together by the skin of your teeth, you did it! And it counts you’re still here 🎉
Many of us just need to give ourselves credit for just making it through the shit show that was 2025.
Bragging and self-acknowledgment really is a radical act of self-love, and we all could use more of that, couldn’t we?
For me, I stepped out of my comfort zone and accepted an invitation to speak at a conference for therapists. They asked me back again for next year, which is exciting, but more than that, it made me question the limiting belief I’d been carrying about my worthiness, about my contributions, about what I have to offer.
What did you do that was out of your comfort zone in 2025?
What muscles did you build? How did it play out? What were you proudest of? When you look back on the year, what are the things, the experiences, the choices that make you smile? And really let yourself get into this list.
I feel like there’s a lingering thing that we were taught as kids, that there’s something wrong with bragging. I believe it is a valuable habit to master because it’s self-acknowledgement which builds self-esteem!
And with my own kids and clients, instead of saying, “I’m so proud of you,” I’ll say, “I hope you’re proud of you,” because what matters is what they think about themselves (and that goes for you, too!).
List Three: The Crap You’re Leaving in 2025
This might be my favorite part.
Look back through your peak experiences and think about all the different areas of your life.
What are you ready to release? What was stressful, what was painful? What crap do we not want to drag into 2026?
People, places, things, feelings, circumstances, experiences. Anything that makes you think, “Oh my god, bye bye, leave it.”
Write it all down. This list is going to be very cathartic, and later, we’re going to burn it.
So much of the time, we just roll from one year to the next. As my friend davidji would say, we get up, burn through the day, drop, go to sleep, do it all over again.
This ritual is a pattern interruption filled with joy, possibility, and hope, and it actually does something.
What you think about matters. What you’re holding onto, including resentment, is heavy, and it gets in the way of other things that you want.
List Four: Gems of Wisdom from 2025
A lot of the gems of wisdom come from the hardest struggles.
There are gems of wisdom for you in every ‘crap stew’ situation you survived in 2025. You just have to be willing to roll up your sleeves, get your hands dirty, and find them.
What did you learn about yourself? These gems of wisdom are really gems of self-knowledge that you will take with you into these next 12 months, so you don’t have to keep repeating the crappy situations.
How do we change them? We acknowledge them, we pivot, we make a decision, we do something different.
Be specific. Ask yourself: What did I learn from this? How will it influence what I do going forward? How did it impact my self-identity?
List Five: What Are You Creating in 2026?
Now that you’ve processed the good, the bad, the ugly, and the lessons, it’s time to think about how you want to feel in the coming year.
This is your space to commit to what you’re creating with your one big, beautiful life.
I love my dear friend Danielle LaPorte’s core desired feelings work. It isn’t just what we want, because a lot of times what we think we want won’t produce what we really want, which is a particular feeling.
How do you want to feel in your relationships? Cherished, loved, adored?
How do you want to feel in your body? Vibrant, energized, beautiful?
Start with the feeling state, then back into what will create it.
Be as specific as possible. Specificity really matters when you’re creating.
The Burn Ritual
Keep your brag list and your gems of wisdom somewhere you can access them easily. Read them when you need a reminder of how capable and amazing you really are.
Your creation list for 2026? Put it somewhere you’ll see it often.
My friend Sabrina Soto puts hers in a plastic sleeve in her shower and looks at it every single day, feeling the feelings of having those things. She’s the most insane manifester I’ve ever met.
And then list number three, the crap you’re leaving behind? Burn it.
Make sure you burn it somewhere safe and legal. I one time burnt my list on 58th and 8th Avenue and a policeman came over and was like, “Hello, what are you doing??” I grew up in New Jersey, and I didn’t know that lighting a fire in a garbage can in New York City was illegal. I was young. Anyway, that was many moons ago.
The point is: safe and legal.
As your list burns, visualize that energy being released back into the universe. When it’s done, say this simple affirmation: I am so happy and grateful. Now I am free.
And you are free.
Free to create what you want. You just have to have the audacity of hope and the willingness to work and the strength to reflect.
Even if the world is a dumpster fire shit show (which, kind of), we still have the right to change our own lives.
So gather your people, make some space, and give yourself this gift.
If you want the full ritual with all five lists and space to do the work, grab the free guide here.
2026, baby… Here we come!!
Frequently Asked Questions
Terri Cole, LCSW, answers common questions about this end of year ritual:
Why don’t New Year’s resolutions work? New Year’s resolutions often fail because we try to decide what we want to change without first processing the year we just lived through. We skip straight to goal-setting without reflecting on what happened, what we learned, and what we’re still carrying. Without that awareness, we end up repeating the same patterns. A more effective approach is to reflect, release, and then create from a place of clarity.
What is an end of year reflection ritual? An end of year reflection ritual is a structured practice for processing the experiences of the past twelve months before setting intentions for the new year. This might include listing peak experiences, acknowledging accomplishments, identifying what you want to release, extracting lessons learned, and getting clear on how you want to feel moving forward. It’s a therapeutic alternative to traditional resolutions.
What is a burning ritual for the new year? A burning ritual is a symbolic practice where you write down the things you want to release (stress, painful experiences, patterns, resentments) and then safely burn the paper. As the list burns, you visualize that energy being released. It’s a powerful way to reaffirm that you are done with what no longer serves you and are freeing yourself to create something new.
How do I figure out what I really want for the new year? Instead of starting with what you want to do or achieve, start with how you want to feel. Ask yourself: How do I want to feel in my relationships, my body, my home, my work? When you identify your core desired feelings first, you can then back into the experiences and choices that will actually create those feelings. Specificity matters, so get as clear as possible.
