34. Reflection Matters More Than Resolutions: A New Year Practice to Live with Intention

In this New Year’s episode of Nourished, Dr. Anikó offers an alternative to resolutions and rigid intentions, inviting listeners into a quieter, more meaningful way of entering the year ahead. Through a personal ritual rooted in reflection, embodiment, and compassion, she shares how looking back on the year we’ve lived can become one of the most powerful tools for living with intention.

Rather than striving to fix or reinvent ourselves, this episode centers on integration. Dr. Anikó walks through her annual practice of reviewing the year month by month, using memory, photographs, and writing to reconnect with moments of joy, challenge, grief, and aliveness that might otherwise be forgotten. This process is about honoring life as it actually unfolded.

A key theme throughout the episode is the importance of starting reflection from the body rather than the mind. Through movement, time in nature, meditation, and simple practices like “shaking the bones,” Dr. Anikó explains how embodiment helps us access intuition and truth without overthinking or forcing meaning.

This conversation also builds on the idea of a grief-informed life. Difficult moments, losses, regrets, and emotional pain are not obstacles to intentional living; they are teachers. When we allow ourselves to feel, name, and reflect on these experiences, they offer guidance for how we want to live moving forward, without bypassing or getting stuck.

Dr. Anikó emphasizes that there is no universal blueprint for a fulfilling life. What brings meaning, joy, and vitality is deeply personal. Reflection helps us notice patterns, recognize what truly nourishes us, and make choices that align with who we are, rather than who we think we should be.

This episode is especially resonant for anyone feeling disillusioned with New Year’s resolutions, navigating grief or transition, or craving a more intentional relationship with time, energy, and life itself.

In this episode, you’ll explore:

• Why reflection can be more sustaining than resolutions
• How reviewing your year helps integrate joy, grief, and lived experience
• The role of embodiment in meaningful self-reflection
• How noticing patterns can guide future choices with clarity and compassion
• Why intention begins with honoring what has already shaped you

This episode is an invitation to slow down, listen inward, and let your lived experience guide the year ahead. Not through pressure or reinvention, but through presence, reflection, and care.

Connect with Dr. Anikó:

Instagram: https://www.instagram.com/dr.aniko/

Website: https://www.draniko.com/

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Disclaimer:
The content of this podcast is for informational and entertainment purposes only and does not constitute medical advice, diagnosis, or treatment. The views expressed are those of the host and guests and do not substitute for professional medical advice. Always seek the guidance of your physician or other qualified healthcare provider with any questions you may have regarding your health or a medical condition. Never disregard professional medical advice or delay seeking it because of something you heard on this podcast.

Transcript

Dr. Anikó: [00:00:00] Hi, you are listening to Nourished with Dr. Anikó Gréger. This podcast is all about the many, many ways you can support your health and your family's health. I'm an integrative physician and I am so passionate about helping people. Their pathway to their very best life. I hope you enjoy. Hello? Hello y'all, and welcome back to another episode of Nourished with Dr.

Aniko. Today is New Year's Eve, so I thought I would share my New Year's ritual with y'all and I never really. Gelled with the idea of a New Year's resolution or even a New Year's intention. Somehow it just didn't work for me. And so I started doing this practice a few years ago, [00:01:00] and this one feels really, really good.

And it happens to coincide with a yearly retreat that I do alone. Which is such a, I'm just so grateful for it just to have that time to myself, to be in nature, and to be in a really reflective sort of meditative space where it really is a retreat. Like I'm retreating from all of the outside stimuli and really going inward and.

If you can do a retreat at the new year, go for it. It's amazing. But you don't actually have to go anywhere to retreats. You can actually go into yourself. And so what I do every new year is, or around the new year rather, because it's typically in January, not New Year's Eve specifically, but it does always coincide with the beginning of a new year.[00:02:00] 

Is that I get a brand new notebook and I reflect back on the year that I just lived the last most recent year of my life. And I don't love using technology or screens, but for this one, it really does help me to go into my phone and look at all my pictures. And so I go month by month, I start with.

January of that year and going through the year that way, especially with those pictures, really allows me to just remember it. There's so much that I forget in a year of my life. It sort of reminds me of the. Ritual of before going to bed to name three of your favorite parts of the day. Because otherwise you just kind of zoom past them and you don't integrate them.

And it's just such a beautiful practice to do before you go to sleep. It [00:03:00] gives you a chance to integrate that as you sleep. And so I feel similarly about this ritual of going through your year and. Finding all those bright spots, all those wonderful moments, all of your favorite parts that you might've missed otherwise.

So I go through the months of the year, month by month, and I write down, you know, January and Bright spots, difficult things, um, places for growth, places where I shine. You can really choose to look at it however you'd like. I would encourage you to not. Avoid the difficult things, right? We're not trying to put this positive spin on things that maybe weren't positive, right?

We're just trying to reflect on our life as it is, but not let all of those bright spots get away from us. So this actually takes quite a while. It usually takes me. [00:04:00] At least an hour, if not more. But it's fun. It's not like unpleasant. In fact, it's very pleasant and it's very luxurious in some ways to have this space devoted to reflection.

And because I do this every year in the same place in nature, I do this outside. Before I get on my phone and look through all my pictures and start writing, I either meditate or maybe I'll take a hike, or maybe I'll just do some kind of movement. One that I do like is called Shaking the Bones. It literally is just shaking your body and you really try to get your head into it.

Um, you sort of bend your knees and let your body just kind of loosely shake. And I try to do that for two to three minutes. Really [00:05:00] allowing yourself to get into your body so that you're not. Reflecting from a super cerebral place, it kind of sets you up to reflect on your life from an embodied perspective.

And I am somebody who loves pictures anyway. It's a problem in some ways. Beginner. It involves a lot of storage, like physical storage, and then just storage space on my devices because I love looking at pictures. I love remembering moments in my life. And so this is a really enjoyable practice that really takes you back into these moments of your life.

And again, we don't. Me too, or want to shy away from the parts that were hard because those are important to note. Some things that are hard are because we are grieving a loss. Some things that are hard are because. [00:06:00] We feel like we made a mistake in some way. There's all kinds of ways that things can be difficult, and it's important to note them so that we can integrate them and learn from them if there are lessons to learn.

If we're grieving a loss, we may be feeling like, Ugh, I wish that I had spent more time with that person. Or maybe I wish I had done that spontaneous trip that. Just felt impossible to do, but I was just getting in my own way. This can inform the decisions that we make in our next year and the year after that.

These things that we notice and that we note in our notebook. Will help guide us in a very direct way for not just the next year, but for the rest of our lives. And again, going back to the conversation with Ama [00:07:00] Alsa, where we talked about grief, and then the subsequent podcast episode where I talked about.

The grief informed life and how not expressing our emotions can lead to illness. This is kind of another take on a grief informed life. This looking back on our year. Letting our joy, our celebrations, the things that we look back and say, oh, that was a great moment. And also the things that we look back and say, oh, that was a hard moment, and Oh, I'm really grieving that.

It is all a guide for how we can live our most fulfilling life that is uniquely ours because it won't be the same for. Everybody. Some people love traveling to new places. Some people love going to the same place again and again. Some people [00:08:00] love cozy time at home. Some people love to go out in the world and have an adventure.

There's no right or wrong answer to any of those. There is just what lights you up where you feel the most alive and the most fulfilled, and again. The goal is not to design a life devoid of pain or grief or sadness. That's not a thing, that's not possible, that's not life. But the idea is to experience all of those emotions and allow them to teach us what they have to teach us so we don't get stuck in them.

We learn from them. So as we go through month, by month, by month on another paper, and I leave a lot of room for the month because I like to write and I, I take up a lot of space [00:09:00] and use a lot of words to describe each month and all the wonderful. Experiences and difficult experiences, just all, all of the life that has happened and that I have lived.

And then in a separate page, I write down the bright spots, the places where I feel like, yeah, I want more of that. And then also, what was hard and what was hard doesn't necessarily mean, oh, I'm gonna avoid that. Although there are certainly lessons that we can learn that do mean that you avoid, that you might notice patterns in yourself that like, wow, I really tend to befriend certain people that maybe I shouldn't, and maybe that's a pattern, or I always feel really bad after I spend time with this particular person, or maybe in this particular role, and what can I learn from that?

And the lesson could be. I'm not gonna [00:10:00] mix myself up with those people anymore, or it could be I need to approach these situations from a different place. I am losing myself in these situations and how can I stay true to who I am and be in these roles or these situations, or these friendships, or whatever it is, right?

Again, the answer is uniquely yours, but it takes. You to remember it, to reflect upon it, to notice how it impacts your life, and to notice what guidance it's giving you. For the rest of your life, and obviously planning out the rest of your life can feel a little bit like a lot, a little overwhelming. So that's why doing it year by year not only allows us to kind of regularly keep checking in with ourselves, but it feels like a doable amount of time to plan out.

Maybe I shouldn't say plan. I don't [00:11:00] love the word plan either. To invite, to invite in and to explore and to learn from and to commit to a year of integrating these lessons maybe is the best way to put it. Because that not only feels doable to me, that feels good to me. That's something I want to do. And.

It can be really easy to overthink a lot of this, so that's why it can be so helpful to start with some movement, shaking the bones, a hike, a walk, and then meditating to kind of let that energy settle. Then really trust your gut. Just don't think too much about what stands out to you. Don't try to justify it.

You know, this was so important because it was, it was great. It was important. It could be a moment. I mean, [00:12:00] I remember a moment from last year where I was in a grocery store and this complete stranger and I were really rocking out to this song and. The gentleman, I'm assuming he is a wife, but some, like a very close person at any rate was like, oh, you found a friend.

Y'all should hang out together. And that stands out as a bright spot in my life. I remember that. I don't remember what month it happened in, but I remember that. And that is big enough, important enough to be on my list because it meant something to me and it landed for me in some way. So I invite you to just really be free with this and not get too in your head.

Just really let it flow. Let it come out into your words, even if it's just like a free association. Whatever gets you feeling responsive to your gut instincts, use [00:13:00] that tap into that part of yourself. And so after you have done your month by month, and then you keep that separate page or more maybe where you have the bright spots, the difficult spots.

Then you go through that list and you start to think, why were those spots bright? Was it the person I was spending time with? Was it just spending time with a person? Was it exploring a new place? That just makes me feel really alive? Just figure that out a little bit for yourself, and then write down.

Three ways or more. You don't have to limit yourself, but I don't wanna give y'all, you know, right. A hundred ways that you, that you wanna do this, but three ways that you can invite that aliveness into your life more. And then with the things that were hard, sit with those two. Why were those hard? There are some that are really obvious.

Maybe you [00:14:00] lost a loved one. It makes a lot of sense that that would be hard, and maybe that means that in this year, connecting with people will be really important. Maybe starting to see a therapist could be really important. Maybe doing something that brings you joy. Connects you with them could be really important.

And again, the episode with Ammar Ahma, ALSA grief is loved. Make space for your grief. Talk to your loved ones. Write them letters. Stay connected with them because you are still connected with them. Your grief is your love. You are still connected with them. And make space for that in your life as you move forward.

And so similar to the other category, three ways that you are learning from the things that have happened in this past year that were hard. Maybe you're learning that you really need to connect more to [00:15:00] your community. Maybe you're learning that you need to start seeing a therapist. Maybe you're learning that there are some relationships that are really causing you to abandon yourself.

And you're needing to learn ways to honor yourself and honor the people with whom you're in relationship with. There's no, again, there's no one size fits all answer. There's just your answer. There's just your life. But when we don't. Stop and reflect or integrate. Life has a way of just kind of zooming by in this way that ends up being really kind of unintentional.

It's sort of like how when we're not thoughtful about how we spend our time. Our relatively nonstop 24 7 go, go, go. Lifestyles will just suck up that lifetime of us in ways that maybe we are not super happy with. [00:16:00] So as much as sometimes creating a schedule doesn't always feel great, it doesn't really have to be a schedule.

It can just be always keeping in mind. That your time and your life energy, your lifetime is precious, and how do you wanna spend that precious time? And so the new year is a really beautiful time to sit with this, reflect on this and figure out. What is the most meaningful use of your lifetime? And at least in the Northern Hemisphere, this tends to be a time where it's dark more often.

It's colder. It's a natural time for reflection, and it can be hard for many people because a lot of us like more sunlight in our lives. But it can also be a really wonderful invitation into that. Quiet into that. Darkness [00:17:00] within, and I, I don't mean darkness in any kind of negative way. Just that quiet, dark place that has so much wisdom when we listen to it.

So I hope this helps. I wish you all a deeply joyful, deeply alive New Year, and I will see you next year. Take care, y'all.

Thank you so much for listening to Nourish Today. Your presence is truly felt and so deeply appreciated. I hope today's episode brought you some insight and also some inspiration to create an even better life and world for yourself and for your community. If you enjoyed this episode, please don't forget to follow the podcast and leave a review and please share Nourish with a friend.

It helps more people discover the power of true nourishment. [00:18:00] Until next time, take good care of yourself and your people and stay nourished.