Your Best Year Ever, Chapter 4: Thinking Backward Is a Must

0:02Wow, it means the world to me that you're listening to this newly revised your best year ever. And I so hope that you've been getting so much value out of the book already. This first part of the book is only the beginning. Just wait until we really dive into designing your future, which is coming up soon. I'm going to show you what it takes to make a great goal. How habit goals are different than achievement goals and the key elements to both. And then we're going to dig deep into why your goals matter to you. and I'm so excited for us to dive into that because that is the game changer in terms of achieving your goals.

0:38We're gonna be sharing that content a little bit at a time but if you don't wanna wait, I wanna encourage you to go ahead and buy the book. You can go to Amazon or Audible now to buy it and if you buy the book before December the 31st, 2023, make sure to go to yourbestyeareverbook.com. Now, why is that important? Well, enter your order number in and once you do that, I'm gonna send you a free ticket to our biggest virtual live event of the year. It's called Your Best Year Ever Live. We've done this for several years. Many people tell us it was the beginning of the best year in their life. So that's where we're gonna dive deep into the content for the book.

1:17And that's where we're going to dive deep into the content for the book and go even deeper. You'll walk away with a complete set of goals for the year and an action plan to achieve them. Now, normally we sell these tickets for$197, But if you buy the book, I'm going to give it to you free. So don't wait. Go buy the book and go get your free ticket to Your Best Year Ever Live at yourbestyeareverbook.com. Chapter 4, Thinking Backward is a Must. We drive into the future using only our rearview mirror. Marshall McLuhan. You should always take the best from the past, leave the worst back there, and go forward into the future.

1:59Bob Dylan. I've spent most of my professional life in publishing. I've worked pretty much every job in the business, marketing, editorial, management. I even spent some time in literary representation and artist management. One of my clients had a number of very successful projects under his belt, and I was setting him up for what my business partner and I hoped would be a major new deal. I worked my tail off for about a year, focusing exclusively on this one client. Before taking his new book to publishers, my business partner and I conducted a 90-day, 30-city tour with our client. Turnout was fantastic.

2:39We ran between 1 ,500 and 2 ,000 people a night. When it was all done, my team and I were exhausted. But it was worth it. Our client's existing publisher took notice and offered a preemptive two-book deal for a million dollars a book. Wow! My partner and I were over the moon excited. We'd invested a lot in this deal, and it was about to pay off in a big way. We told our client and expected an enthusiastic response. But then we couldn't get our calls returned. It was stone-cold silence. Something was up. After trying for a few weeks, I finally got a response. It was written in legalese, but the message was clear.

3:19On the verge of my biggest deal to date, I got fired. The deal I had lined up for my client was huge. But it made him think he could land an even bigger fish. He signed with an agency that promised they could do better. Meanwhile, I was left high and dry with nothing to show for my year-long investment. It sent me into a tailspin. I was an emotional wreck. I felt like my career was over. Backward Thinking Completing the past is an essential part of designing a better future. Reasoning flows not only forward, as psychologists Daniel Kahneman and Dale Miller say, but also backward, from the experience to what it reminds us of or makes us think about.

4:03They call this the power of backward thinking. If we're going to experience our best year ever, we need to harness the power of backward thinking for ourselves. Why? We can't complete the past until we acknowledge what we've already experienced. As a friend once told me, an experience is not complete until it's remembered. We can't just ignore it or wish it away. Whatever we've experienced over the last 12 months or even further back must be addressed. If we try to ignore it, it's just going to come back to bite us. How? Sometimes we live inside unhelpful stories we tell ourselves. Other times we nurse grievances to justify our current actions or feel unvalued because we were slighted or disregarded in some way.

4:46If we don't get resolution, we'll drag all our unfinished business into the future, and it'll sabotage everything we're trying to build going forward. Now, before going any further, I want to stress something. The process I outline next is designed to help you deal with setbacks and frustrations. It's not designed to help you deal with serious trauma. Many of us have endured some real shocks, even catastrophes. Maybe you lost a marriage. Maybe you lost a loved one. Maybe you experienced an accident, an illness, a violent attack, or a total loss of your business. Unless and until you deal with traumatic events, they can influence and even define your future in deeply unhealthy ways.

5:27What I detail below can only get you so far. If you need to bring in outside resources, such as a therapist, I recommend that you do. As Brene Brown says, that's pure courage. For the rest of us, listing our disappointments and processing them can suffice. Along with that, let me hasten to add that we must also process our successes and achievements. It's essential to note when things go well. Like Bob Dylan said, we take the best from the past with us into the future. The After Action Review The U.S. Army has a helpful backward-thinking method. It's called the After Action Review. First developed in 1981, it has been used ever since by America's armed forces to improve performance and get better at what they do.

6:14After an event, the goal is to understand what happened, why it happened, and how they can improve. Lots of businesses use this process, and we can use it too. This kind of backward thinking will put you in an excellent frame of mind as you get ready to design your future and experience your best year ever. Marilyn Darling, Charles Perry, and Joseph Moore studied the after-action review process for Harvard Business Review. They give the example of a training battle in the California desert. I'll call the two sides Team 1 and Team 2. Team 1 was top-notch and rarely defeated. Their job was to help train Team 2 by running them through a near-life scenario.

6:54But in this case, Team 2 managed to surprise the trainers with an unforeseen attack plan. Whoops! Team 2 broke Team 1's defenses and left them outgunned and outmaneuvered. Did the trainers hang their heads in shame and defeat? No. Instead, they conducted an after-action review. They studied what went wrong, what went right, and how to adjust their approach in the future. In fact, Team 1's commander called it a good rehearsal for upcoming engagements. Why is this important? Because completing the past is all about moving into the future. As the authors of the HBR study say, an after-action review is a living, pervasive process that explicitly connects past experience with future action.

7:40I'll break down this review process into four key stages. We'll move through each stage with several questions, and I encourage you to use a journal or a notebook to jot down your answers. Writing is a powerful tool for leveraging the benefits of backward thinking. According to a study by University of California researchers, Sonia Lubbersky, Lori Sousa, and Renee Dickerhoff, participants who processed a negative experience through writing or talking reported improved life satisfaction and enhanced mental and physical health relative to those who merely thought about it. Ready to begin? Stage one, state what you wanted to happen.

8:20For the military, this is pretty straightforward. Think of it as the battle plan or the object of the mission. For you, this could be your list of goals from the prior year. It could also be something less definite. Maybe it's a hope, a dream, or an unstated expectation. Start by asking yourself, how did I see the year going? And what were my plans, my dreams, my concrete goals, if I had any? Don't focus on just one or two areas. Remember, our lives consist of nine interrelated domains. Body, mind, spirit, love, family, community, money, work, and hobbies. It's important to get clear on what you wanted to happen across all these domains.

9:02In the case of my personal example at the beginning of this chapter, I wanted to raise my client's visibility, enhance his desirability to publishers, and land the biggest deal of my career to that point. Blake, one of my Your Best Year Ever alumni, planned to move to New York, find a new job, and invest in a long-term relationship. But right before he took the leap, life took a turn. His girlfriend broke off their relationship while he was visiting New York. It was a Monday. On Wednesday, his neighbor back home called to say a tree had fallen on his house. Fortunately, nobody got hurt, Blake said, but they did condemn the building.

9:38If that weren't enough, his mom called that same week and said she was selling her house, which was an emotional blow because he grew up there and had a lot of attachment to the place. So I went from going to pursue this girl and do this new career to no relationship, homeless, and no childhood home either. If his year had been a movie, Blake said it would have been titled, I didn't expect it to go that way. Maybe you can relate. As you think through each life domain, don't be surprised if you start feeling uncomfortable. I can tell you from previous clients who have worked this process that you might experience profound emotion.

10:14Some people feel disappointment. Others feel real excitement. Some feel sad. Others get angry. I had so much emotional baggage around having failed achieving my goals in the past and around my health problems and unresolved conflicts in relationships, admitted Ray, another your best year ever alum. I never before had the emotional experience I had going through that complete the past exercise. This isn't true for everyone, of course. Mileage varies, as they say. Some people feel energized by the performance in the prior year. And don't be surprised if you don't feel any significant emotion at all.

10:48The important thing is to just be aware of your feelings as you work through these four stages. Hey, I just wanted to drop in here for a minute. Are you enjoying this chapter from your best year ever? If it provided motivation or clarity, would you consider leaving a review? Personally, I always check reviews before buying something on Amazon. That's why leaving an honest review is so important. It'd mean the world to me. So if you're up for it, would you take just a couple of minutes, go to Amazon or go to Audible, maybe even both, and leave a short, honest review? Just search your best year ever and let me know what you think.

11:28Thanks so much. Step two, acknowledge what actually happened. As you stated what you wanted to happen, you probably became aware of some gaps. You wanted to drive from Los Angeles to New Jersey. Meanwhile, your car threw a rod in Arkansas. There's a distance between your desire and current reality. Some of your goals, perhaps many of them, remain unfulfilled. So ask yourself, what disappointments or regrets did I experience this past year? Because these memories can be painful, it's tempting to dismiss or ignore them. But as journalist Karina Chikano says, the point of regret is not to try to change the past, but to shed light on the present.

12:10You don't want to leave these memories hanging in the air or push them behind you like they don't matter. Both will prevent you from taking meaningful action in the present. I'll return to the subject of regret in the next chapter. I want to share some research findings that can trigger powerful personal and professional growth in the coming year. For now, it's enough to jot down your disappointments so you can begin doing business with them. Another question to ask yourself, what did I feel I should have been acknowledged for but wasn't? This question was powerful for your Best Year Ever alum, James.

12:42A lot of my limiting beliefs came from the past and the failures I had, he said. Truthfully, they weren't big failures, but my mindset at the time was, you're failing, you're failing, you're failing. There were a lot of things that I wasn't acknowledged for, and I translated that into, well, you must have not done well enough. When he recognized that, James was able to reframe it. No, he told himself, you weren't acknowledged because you were in the wrong place. That realization ultimately led to renewed confidence and an important career change. Let's face it. Some version of that story happens to all of us.

13:19Maybe you're a single mom who works hard, provides for your kids, and overcomes the odds every day. Or maybe you've made the heroic decision to stand for your marriage when you really felt like quitting. Maybe you committed to sacrifice part of your morning to exercise when it felt like you really didn't have the time. Whatever it is, there's real emotional power in just admitting what we wish others would have noticed and commended in our actions, but maybe didn't. Don't stop there. Ask yourself, what did I accomplish this past year that I was most proud of? Completing the past is not just about processing failures and disappointments.

13:54It's also about acknowledging and celebrating your wins. It's important to observe not only what went wrong, but also what went right, and how your beliefs and behaviors contributed to that outcome. We often downplay this, or never think to do it. But it's a key to recognizing our agency and how we've overcome obstacles already. That gives us confidence for the future. It could have been something like running a 10K or even a half marathon this last year. Or maybe you celebrated a milestone in your job or marriage. Maybe you completed a degree or paid off the last of your student debt. Maybe you launched a new business or beat your sales targets by a significant percentage.

14:34Regardless of what it is, it's important to acknowledge what you accomplished this past year. I bet you're doing better than you give yourself credit for. Natalie, the Your Best Year Ever alum I introduced earlier, said this exercise was pivotal for her. She came alive as she analyzed the positive impact she'd had on people she left in her previous job. I realized that I had done some really amazing things, she said. It felt good for me to acknowledge that myself, but it also felt good to acknowledge that I was moving across the country and I was picking up my whole life. I was quitting this job that I loved and I was doing it for my family.

15:08It was really good that I took the time to congratulate myself on those accomplishments. For our next question, ask, how do the events of the past year, good or bad, ultimately serve for my benefit? This is where we can most intentionally begin reframing our experience into more empowering stories about our past. I'm not talking about ignoring real setbacks, hurts, or disappointments. I'm talking about choosing to imbue those experiences with beneficial meaning. How we characterize the past matters every bit as much as what actually occurred, if not far more. When you frame the past negatively, warns Benjamin Hardy, your goals become reactive to and based on your past.

15:50Your goals become short-term and avoidance-oriented, where you try escaping the pain of the present. On the other hand, he says, Having a positive past depends very little on what events actually occurred. What happened to you doesn't matter as much as what story you decide to tell yourself about what happened. The story you create about past events dictates what your past means to your present and to your future self. To finish this stage, it's useful to tease out some themes. What were two or three specific themes that kept recurring? These could be single words, phrases, or even complete sentences.

16:27For me, this past year was about being highly productive while protecting my margin. Not only did we launch a new book, Mind Your Mindset, I also set aside more time for writing and coaching clients. But it was vital for me to do so while still getting the rest and rejuvenation that makes that kind of productivity possible in the first place. That's just me. Maybe your theme was making difficult decisions in a challenging economy. Another one could be challenging negative beliefs about your body. Or maybe it was stepping out and starting a new business. Or restoring a damaged relationship. There are as many examples as there are people.

17:03Stage three, learn from the experience. Let me go back to the story that started the chapter. When my client fired me on the verge of our biggest deal to date, it floored me. I thought I'd done a great job. Besides, we had enjoyed a long-term personal relationship. I worked my tail off for about a year, focusing exclusively on this one client. But my client wasn't so impressed. He had his eye on bigger things and decided I couldn't take him there. So without so much as a discussion, he dumped me. In the end, it was a humbling but helpful experience. I learned three important lessons. First, clients and customers can be fickle.

17:43I can't afford to put all my eggs in one basket. If I don't spread the risk, I might find myself in serious trouble again. Second, I learned I can't assume today's victories will be remembered or appreciated. I have to keep raising the bar. Finally, I learned I need to secure alignment from all the relevant parties up front. It turned out my client and his board had different ideas about what I was delivering. All three lessons have been invaluable over the years. What about you? Ask yourself, what were the major life lessons I learned this past year? Unless we learn from our experiences, we can't grow.

18:21You've probably heard the line from the Spanish philosopher George Santayana. those who cannot remember the past or condemn to repeat it. If you have trouble identifying your key lessons from the year, one way to suss them out is to ask what was missing from your success. Maybe it was strategic planning. You wish you had done more of that in your business. Maybe you wished you had saved more money, spent more time with your spouse, or played more with your kids, or taken a sabbatical, or read more books. Listing these missing ingredients is an effective way to learn what went wrong and what it would take to go right in the future.

18:56Santayana also said, progress depends on retentiveness. To retain these lessons, you want to distill your discoveries into short, pithy statements. That transforms your learning into wisdom to guide your path into the future. Just for an example, here's one I wrote down a couple of years ago. There comes a point in every experience when I'm too far in to quit, but almost certain I can't finish. If I keep moving forward, I'll eventually get to the other side. That was an important life lesson for me to learn at that time, and I can pull it up when I face similar circumstances today. Here's another one.

19:31Don't overthink the outcome. Just do the next right thing. Or, I can do anything I want, I just can't do everything I want. I'm still not done learning that lesson. You get the idea. Distill the lessons from your experiences so you don't lose them and so they can serve as tools moving forward. Stage 4. Adjust your behavior. If something in your beliefs and behaviors contributed to the gap between what you wanted to happen and what actually happened, something has to change. In fact, that gap will only widen and worsen unless you pivot. It's not enough to acknowledge the gap. It's not even enough to learn from the experience.

20:08If you don't change your beliefs and how you act on them, you're actually worse off than when you started. If I hadn't adjusted my behavior as a result of what I learned from losing my business, all that grief would have been for nothing. I would have found myself in the same situation again and again. Instead, as I've progressed in my career, I've acted on those lessons and saved myself a lot of trouble as a result. I mentioned before that businesses often use after-action reviews to improve their performance. But the improvement doesn't always happen, does it? The reason, according to Harvard Business Review, is that organizations drop the ball at the end.

20:45They usually don't apply what they learned, so their findings just gather dust on a shelf or get lost on a server someplace. Don't let that happen to you. Going forward. Despite the rough start, after finishing his After Action review, Ray said it was the most powerful part of the course for him. Why? When I was done with the process, I felt so clear. It was like there were a thousand little windows open on my computer at the same time when I was able to click, close all the windows. It was very freeing. I bet the same will be true for you. Thinking backward like this can help us learn from the past and positively build our futures.

21:25The four stages of an effective after-action review are beneficial for completing your past. But it's also beneficial to recognize that some of our greatest disappointments may lead us to our greatest possibilities for the new year. I'll cover that next.

21:45Hey there. First of all, thanks for listening. There's one thing I know about you already. You have a bigger and brighter future ahead of you than what's behind you. And I'd be willing to bet there's other people in your life you feel the same way about. If you found this book helpful so far, would you do me a favor and take just a couple of seconds and share it with your spouse, a friend, somebody else in your life that you think could benefit? All you got to do is take a second, hit the share button now. That would mean the world to me. Your sharing means that we can help more people achieve their goals and have a better future than their past.

22:22I really appreciate it.