How I'm Using the Week Between Christmas and New Year’s to Review, Reset, and Lock In for 2026
Your ultimate guide to set yourself up for success in 2026
The week between Christmas and New Year’s is one of my absolute favorite times of the year.
Ever since I left the hospital seven years ago, this window of time has become sacred to me. It’s a retreat. A reset. A return to myself.
This week isn’t about setting a bunch of goals for the year that I may or may not act on. It’s about diligently creating the internal and external conditions that make alignment inevitable.
I have more rituals than I can realistically fit into one week, but over time I’ve refined my process into three simple categories:
Review. Reset. Lock in.
Here’s exactly how I use this in-between space to clear the past year, create room, and anchor myself into what I’m building next.
There’s Something You Have to Do Before We Get Into The Rituals…
Before I do any reflection, planning, or visioning, I make space for it.
This year, I’ve cleared my calendar so that for the first 6 hours of every day, I’m in my own zone.
That time is mine to do whatever I want, and it tends to look a little something like this.
I go to beautiful cafés. I put my phone is on Do Not Disturb. I journal extensively. I live inside my Notion planning system. I reflect, review, and zoom out. I use large whiteboards and big pieces of paper for visioning. I spend time in nature. I meditate. I intentionally limit screen time
I am also using this time to host: A 3-day virtual workshop for my clients + friends (which you can learn more about here ⤵️)
I’m deeply in my zone — with myself and the bigger picture of my life.
Now to be clear, you don’t have to clear out 6 hours a day. You could clear out 1 hour a day, or maybe you do two half days of 4 hrs each. There’s not one set amount of time required. Just do what you can to make some time for you this year.
Once I have that space cleared out. I’m ready to start implementing my different rituals.
And I don’t necessarily do every single thing on my list every single year. I’m going to share with you some of the different practices that I like to do in each category- that doesn’t mean you need to do the mall.
Choose the ones that are calling to you, or make up your own. Once you’ve cleared up space for yourself- there are no rules about how you have to spend it.
Phase One: Review — Looking Back So You Don’t Repeat the Past
It’s tempting to jump straight into future planning. I feel that pull every year.
But skipping reflection is a mistake.
You can’t grow from what you refuse to look at.
You can’t break patterns you haven’t named.
You can’t build the future clearly if you’re dragging unconscious baggage with you.
This phase is about honest reflection without judgment.
1. Give Yourself Credit (Even If Things “Didn’t Work”)
I start with a simple question:
What did I do this year?
Not just what “worked.”
Not just what made money.
Not just what hit milestones.
Everything.
For me, that looks like:
Every program I created
Every free training I hosted
Every podcast episode I released
Every Substack article I published
Every idea I brought into the world
Even the things that didn’t take off.
Even the projects that didn’t land the way I hoped.
Effort matters. Creation matters. Showing up matters.
We’re often brutal with ourselves about outcomes and completely blind to our own output. This step recalibrates that.
2. The Stress / Joy Test (Month by Month)
This is a new practice that I got from one of my mentors this year and I’m so excited to implement this one. Here’s how it works.
You go month by month and ask:
What brought me joy this month?
What brought me stress this month?
This includes:
Decisions you made
Projects you took on
People you spent time with
This is about pattern recognition.
I haven’t officially done this exercise yet, but as I’m loosely thinking about it, I’m already noticing a pattern.
Co-living brought me stress
Living near walkable trails brought me joy
So for 2026, I’ll likely want LESS coliving and MORE walkable environments. It really can be that simple.
3. The Resource Audit (This One Is Confronting — and Necessary)
We have to get real about where our resources are going so we can intentionally channel them into our goals. The questions I am asking here are:
Where did I spend this resource?
Is that in alignment with my goals and values?
If no… what rule could I make going forward to make sure I direct this resource towards my goals and values?
The three resources I audit:
Time
Money
Attention
Time
When I am looking at time, I review:
My Google calendar
All 52 weekly reviews in my Notion planning spread.
Money
When I am looking at money, I review all my bank statements from the past year. I’m not judging the amount of money spent- I am only looking at alignment within my spending.
Questions I ask:
Was my spending intentional?
Did it support growth, learning, care, and expansion?
What rule do I want to make about how I spend money next year?
Attention
This one can be difficult to audit. Sometimes you need to get creative. Here are some of the places I look to see where I spent my attention.
I look at:
My journal- to see what I was percolating on
Transcripts from my therapy and coaching sessions to see what I bring up with my mentors + support people. (yes… I have an AI notetaker during my therapy sessions- I highly recommend it)
Screen time data
YouTube Wrapped
Voice notes with my friends
Notes app entries.
These show me where my mental energy actually lived this past year.
I haven’t done this yet, but I already know , a lot of my attention went toward resolving (and ruminating) on interpersonal conflict. This is nowhere near aligned with my goals or values.
Reset — Closing Loops and Clearing Space
Resetting is about closing the loops, clearing space, and making room in different areas of your life.
Environmental
Physical
Social
Emotional
Mental
It’s part spring cleaning, Marie Kondo energy and part self care deep dive.
Here’s how I approach it.
Environmental Reset (Physical + Digital)
Here’s what it looks like for me to reset my environment.
As a minimalist and full time traveler my physical environment gets reset every time I move locations- but here are some of the things I do to refresh:
I clean out my makeup bag
Organize my suitcase
Get rid of anything I haven’t used in the past 3 destinations.
My digital environment is where most of the chaos lies. I go into the main digital spaces where I spend my time and try to clear out clutter.
Notion: I delete or archive pages or databased I’m not using anymore, and reorganize my main hub for functionality and simplicity.
Desktop: Clear out all the files that have ended up on my desktop, clear out storage space. Organize documents into folders, etc.
Phone: reorganize the home screen, remove apps I don’t use, put a passcode on apps that distract me, etc.
Email: clear my inbox, unsubscribe from emails I don’t want anymore.
Your environment is either supporting your future goals or keeping you trapped in the past.
Physical Reset
I’m tuning into my body to see what it needs to feel reset and refreshed. Am I tired? Bloated? In pain anywhere? What do I need to feel better physically?
Do I need to fast for 24hrs? Sweat it out in the sauna? Get a massage? Have a full day of sleep? Spend more time outside? Eat more fruits? Hydrate?
What does my body need to feel it’s best? And how can I make that happen this week?
Social Reset
I review my calendar and WhatsApp chats and ask myself….
What commitments no longer fit?
What relationships need an expectations reset?
What group chats or messages can I leave or archive?
Emotional Reset
What am I still holding onto from this past year? What do I need to let go of or process? I make a forgiveness list and I do my forgiveness process to reset here.
Mental Reset
I ask:
What is circling around in my head that is clogging up bandwidth?
Is there something I’m ruminating on that I need to address?
Are there decisions I need to make so I can feel peaceful?
Lock In — Focus, Commitment, and Direction
Locking in is where I get focused, determined and committed to what I’m bringing into my life this coming year.
It’s how I am putting my blinders on so I can go full speed ahead towards my goals in the new year.
Clarifying Mission and Values
I zoom out at least 10 years and ask myself bigger questions like…
What is my mission?
What legacy am I here to create?
What problem am I committed to solving in my lifetime?
Right now here’s what I’ve got:
To help people find the most profitable way to share their gifts, heal others, and heal themselves. To teach others how to become the source of their own income so they can create impact through alignment, not self-abandonment.
It has to feel bigger than me.
Big enough that I don’t know how I’ll fully accomplish it.
This year I am also but a huge emphasis on my values. I’ve narrowed them down to just 3 so I can keep them top of mind at all times.
Becoming Greatness
Inner Leadership
Beginners Mind
My values and mission are my filtering system for this year. They make decisions easy.
If some thing or someone doesn’t fit my values or mission- I say no.
One Goal for the Year (And Defining Progress)
This year I am setting ONE single goal so I can be in full focus. I don’t care if I reach the goal this year, but this is the goal I am working towards.
This year my goal will be something along the lines of…
Build a $1M company by becoming my greatest self.
Now in order for this to be an actual goal, I need to operationalize it more. I need to define progress in two categories:
Revenue indicators
Personal becoming indicators
I haven’t done this yet, but this is part of what we will be doing inside of the Align Your Year workshop.
My Words for the Year
I’m working with two words:
Proximity
Surround myself with people further along
Be the least experienced person in the room
Use proximity and peer pressure intentionally
Process
Focus on how I show up daily
Prioritize actions over outcomes
Anchor into consistency, not urgency
Systems and Skills
The reason most of us set goal that we fail to reach are because we are lacking in two major categories. Systems and skills.
Systems are the vehicle to help you reach your goal. It is the process you will implement to make sure you do the actions required to reach them.
Skills are the ways you need to grow and uplevel to be the person who can actually achieve your goals.
Without developing the right skills and implementing the right systems… we will continue to feel like we are failing at our goals.
This year I am asking myself:
What are the systems I need to put in place to reach my goals?
What are the skills I need to build to reach my goals?
By focusing on systems and skills, I am setting myself up for true success.
Manifestation Rituals:
I also like to do fun, playful manifestation rituals this time of year too: because it doesn’t have to be so serious all the time.
Some of my favorite ones are:
Letter from December 2026 Chelsea: I tap into the energy of my future self and write a letter from her voice. I ask what would you have me know? Then I just free flow write what comes through me.
Vision Board: At my align your year workshop, we always create a digital vision board using Canva. Then I set it as my iphone screensaver and desktop background the entire year.
So that’s what I’ve got for you my loves. This is how I am using the week between Christmas and New Years to Review, Reset, and Lock In for an epic 2026. It’s my favorite time of the year.
If you want to join me for Align Your Year 2026, we will be implementing some of these rituals + practices together. Sign up here.
What about you? How do you like to use this time of year? What rituals and practices do you have? I love to hear what other people do!
Comment below and share!