Season to Reflect

I know we are supposed to wait until New Year’s Day to reflect on our year, but longer nights and colder weather naturally swing my thoughts between reflecting and planning.

Maybe it’s the solstice coming.

Maybe, as my friend declared, in the cold we burrow underground where it is warm and cozy.

In north-central Montana, we need to burrow 6 feet down, below the frost line, to find cozy.

A few days ago, while I was waiting for the sun to rise, I found a letter that I had written to myself last year.

This was my third letter to myself.

I learned this technique at a ranching business school.

At the end of the school, each of us wrote a letter to predict and acknowledge the progress we made throughout the next year.

I had been specific about the changes I would see – fencing improvements, business strategy and personal goals, among other things.

We each addressed our letters, then the conference organizers mailed them to us a year later.

It sounds hokey, but my letter affirmed my plans and turned my head around backward to recognize my progress.

So I wrote another letter to myself.

Three years later, my most recent letter to myself was surprisingly on-target.

With only a few misses, I predicted most of what I would accomplish.

It’s a little eerie.

And it’s fun.

Yesterday, I wrote a fourth letter to myself and hid it in a place I won’t find for a year.

I worried that I won’t find it, but I hid last year’s letter in the same place and I found it on time.

It’s a little eerie.

And it’s fun.

I acknowledged that our record-breaking drought was hard, yet good things came from it.

I need to protect my land from extreme weather and I know how.

I need to get moving on potential uses and income streams for my cool old building and I can.

The drought helped me pivot my business just as the Covid pandemic helped the beef industry pivot.

Far more local sources of good beef exist now because the entire national beef supply chain collapsed during the pandemic.

Rampant inflation helps, too, in a sadistic way.

Some experts advise farmers to budget for 25 percent increases in fertilizer and herbicide costs.

Inflation compels farmers to plow up production efficiencies.

Extreme crises get people to move forward.

When hard times such as a massive drought, inflation or a global pandemic hit suddenly, it’s easy to get bogged down in uncertainty.

I can see the goal, but I can’t seem to find assurance that I’m making the best decision.

That’s when it’s time to stop searching for the best decision and go with a good decision.

It’s like playing the stock market.

It’s a lot easier to make some money if you aren’t trying to make the most money.

I’m not a psychologist, but I know something happens to our brains when we write words on paper.

Not type on a computer but write on paper.

The act of writing on paper clarifies issues in our brain so potential solutions rise to the top.

Writing on paper somehow encourages us to act on those solutions.

As the days darken, I feel the need to declutter my living space, too.

I move books and fill donation bags.

I store the extra table leaf so I have more space to move around.

I don’t dust, though.

Dusting seems like over-achieving.

Writing on paper helps me declutter my brain, just as I declutter my space.

It’s eerie.

And it’s fun.

I wonder what would happen if I wrote my thoughts in the dust?