Gentle prompts for anyone with unresolved end of year feelings
Every year, December comes around and I tell myself I will do better next year - eat better, sleep better, call my mom better, water my plants, hydrate myself, set better boundaries at work, have less boundaries with people I love. It's always the basic, existential things.
Every year I look forward and tell myself it'll be a new world / new day / new me. Every year, I pride myself on how capable my sense of closure is. The ability to leave behind, not notice anymore. This year felt different.
I didn't feel the inner or outer stability to think about what next, it felt arrogant to imagine my future self and try to make decisions for what will be good for her. So when the time came to host an end of year writing group for the Chicago Poetry Center we (dear friend & partner in creative crimes - Darshita Jain & I) decided to intentionally focus on framing prompts that arenât about where weâre headed, but about what goes us here and good, bad, ugly, in-between - are we willing to sit with that today?
If you'd like to partake in some gentle, playful noticing of your then to now story for the year, here goes:
[you can do this in a notebook, digital notes, or say it out loud; in a group, with a writing partner or by yourself]
Start with a check-in with yourself. Complete the sentences below with a word/phrase:
Unsurprisingly, this year for me . Surprisingly, this year for me was __.
Write a 1-3 words you associate with Resolution.
Then take a big breath. Or three. Ready?
Do a 2 minute freewrite in response to any or all of the questions below [stream of consciousness, donât stop writing / typing / doodling / voice noting yourself]
What needed noticing this year?
What uncertainty did you sit with?
What might you have missed this year?
What in-betweens were you in?
What held you this year?
What brought you from then to now?What helped you find space?
What did you preserve?
At this stage in our writing session, we paused the writing to read & discuss some poems. Physical Therapy by Franny Choi, The Conditional by Ada Limon & Iâll be Happy by Bianca Stone. Jump to the bottom if youâd like to read them before getting into your writing. If youâre in flow, I invite you to stay here.
A Little Warm-up [if you need it]
3 places I found myself this yearâŚ
The last song i sang out loud / danced to
This year, I ate from the _ of my _
Come January 1st morning I will not _
This year in my backpack I carried _
Writing Prompts [pick any one, or read them all and see where that takes you]
Pick a part of your body - tell us what it needed & what you gave it this year.
A letter from now you to then you that starts with Dear Traveler / Dear Survivor / Dear ExplorerâŚ
A list of resolutions you will never make / always break
Write a series of fortune cookie style messages for yourself, one for every lived month of 2024 (bonus: with pictures)
After your freewriting, reading and warm-upping, write whatever is in your heart, mind, hands today <3
Would love to see/read anything youâve written in response to these so please share unabashedly <3
Acknowledgements:
Thank you to Darshita Jain who sourced these poems & partnered on this workshop.
Thank you to Shira Erlichman for asking me Whatâs in your backpack recently, that evidently made it into these prompts.
Thank you the wonderful humans who showed up to the workshop last weekend, whose words have stuck to me like glue since.
This workshop is part of a series of fundraisers for the Chicago Poetry Centerâs 50th anniversary year, to help fund 50 poetry residencies for Chicago public school students. If youâve read this far, I hope you consider donating any amount that is personally meaningful to you <3 Our goal is $2500 by February 2025 and I will keep updating this with the progress we make!
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