Wait, where did the year go?!
It’s around the autumnal equinox that we find ourselves asking this question, reflecting on the year with growing urgency and concern.
Before we get too worked up, it’s helpful to pause and ask: Do I actually know where my time has gone this year?
Here’s what I know for sure: even when time feels like it’s flying by, a lot has actually happened. Without looking at my calendar, I can’t even remember what I did in January. It feels so long ago.
I experienced a temporal disconnect and time distortion even back at the end of February. I felt angsty about not having spent enough time on sustaining activities, but then for some reason I thought to look back at what I had actually done over the first eight weeks of the year.
What did I find?
Beyond work, I actually had:
Blocked my first week in January to ease into the year
Attended a women’s circle event that was heartwarming and filled me up
Exercised regularly
Made time for acupuncture appointments
Got a massage
Created spaciousness around work travel
Spent time working from a different location
And had several oh-so-fun visits with friends
“Huh?” I thought. Looking at that list, I had to laugh. “I’ve done more to invest in my personal life and sustaining myself than I’m giving myself credit for.”
A friend shared a similar feeling with me. She acknowledged that day-to-day she gets frustrated by the intensity of her work life and feels as if she is neglecting her home life. Yet when she pulls back and looks at the totality “from the balcony” and with a longer time perspective, she recognizes that she is investing in her sustainability and that she has chosen her life ambitions over her work quite frequently, more often than she realizes.
Her revelation got me thinking—maybe we’re all challenged with a similar blind spot.
If you’re curious about where the time has gone, consider doing a brief review of your calendar year-to-date. You might have different takeaways:
You’ve experienced and done more than you realized…
You feel like you’ve gone off track…
You wish you spent your time differently…
You get the idea.
With this visibility, you’re in a position to choose how you’d like to craft these closing months of the year, and I’d advise, the first month of 2026 (yep, I just wrote that!).
If you’re feeling this time fog too, here’s what you can try:
Review your calendar in a way that allows you to really see what transpired month to month (e.g., I scroll quickly week by week) and document what’s taken place
Step back to reflect and notice where your time has gone (e.g., Oh that’s right, I did take that ½ day to play and read; I’ve been making great progress on that goal; we’ve kept our commitment to family time; we had that big family event; I invested time in training for that event)
Bonus if you have the time/energy for it: note the following…
What energized you?
What drained you?
How would you characterize your year-to-date?
At the end:
At a high level, where would you say you’ve been spending your time? Is it consistent with where you wish you were spending your time?
Where would you like your time to go these last three months of the year?
What do you want to prioritize in the coming weeks as you close the year?
What structures can you put in place to support your wish?
What do you want to put off on the horizon?
Yes, time flows naturally, second by second, as constant as the earth’s turning and its elliptical journey around the sun. It’s helpful to be present to each moment, and it’s equally valuable to reflect back on how we have spent our time to remind ourselves how we have spent our days.
As Annie Dillard wrote in The Writing Life: “How we spend our days is, of course, how we spend our lives. What we do with this hour and that one is what we are doing.”
So here’s my challenge to you: How do you want to spend these final months of 2025? Not in theory, but actually—with intention, focused on what matters most to you.
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Sustainable Ambition offers a strategic approach for pursuing our professional and personal goals in a way that is motivating, meaningful, and manageable from stage to stage, rather than be all consuming in a way that compromises other important aspects of our lives or sacrifices our well-being.