As the year draws to a close, it’s the perfect moment to pause, reflect, and reset.
Whether you’re setting financial goals at the start of the year or not, now is the time to evaluate your progress and accomplishments.
- Did you save for a big purchase, land a new job, or build an emergency fund?
- Maybe you encountered unexpected challenges that shifted your priorities.
Reflecting on 2024 isn’t just about measuring success—it’s about learning from your journey and using those lessons to create even better plans for 2025.
This article will guide you through reflecting on the past year, celebrating your wins, and setting SMART financial goals to make the most of the year ahead.
Let’s dive into how you can turn reflection into action and lay the foundation for a prosperous future!
Reflecting on 2024
If you set goals for yourself at the beginning of the year, whether it was focusing on your health, family, mental health or finances, it’s important to look back on the year and evaluate how you did on these goals!
Even if you don’t have official goals, you can still look at the things you accomplished and reflect on them.
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1. List your major accomplishments.
Take a piece of paper or open up a Word document and write down everything you accomplished for this year.
Nothing is off-limits. Anything you are proud of can be on this list!
For example:
- Did you set a goal to save for your Roth IRA, or did you fully fund your emergency fund?
- Did you get a raise or accept a new job with a salary increase?
- Did you take the time to learn a new skill?
Listing out all of the things you did this year can help you realize how much you accomplished.
It’s so easy to see a year as a failure because you didn’t reach all of your goals.
But even reaching some of your goals and things that you didn’t plan out can help you have a more positive look on the new year.
Plus, part of good financial habits is celebrating your wins, however small they may feel.
2. Write about how you accomplished these goals.
After you’ve listed each goal, write about how you accomplished these accomplishments and even any struggles you’ve faced.
Saving for an emergency fund is a hard thing to do!
- When you started off, how did you feel?
- Throughout the year, as you were saving, did you ever doubt you’d be able to do this?
- Did you face any obstacles? How did you keep yourself on track throughout the year?
- When you accomplished this, how did you feel knowing you completed this huge goal?
This is the reflection part of your year.
Going back and writing about every emotion and stage can help you feel more proud of the hard work you did and the sacrifices you made.
For example, you may have missed out on dinners with friends and social events. While yes, you were working on your goal, you may have felt upset about losing time with them.
However, when you reached this goal, did those worries and fears go away, or do you think you could have taken a better approach?
Be honest with yourself during this reflection.
It will help you understand your own habits, what has helped you find success and what you need to tweak to find better balance with setting financial goals in the future.
3. Write about what you didn’t accomplish.
If you had goals that you wanted to reach, write down and reflect on these as well.
It’s important to understand why you didn’t reach your goal.
- Was it too big of a goal?
- Was it not really a focus for you during the year?
- Did you accomplish half of your goal but not fully get there?
This reflection can help you plan your goals for the following year.
For example, if you had a goal to save money and you didn’t accomplish it, it’s probably because the goal was too vague and not clear enough. Saving money is part of your goal, not the full one.
- Why do you want to save money?
- Where will you save it?
- How much will you save a month?
Setting Financial Goals for 2025
Once you’ve had time to reflect on your 2024 accomplishments and what you didn’t accomplish, it’s time for setting financial goals for 2025.
Take a look at what you find – both what you did and didn’t do – and use that to develop new goals for the new year.
1. List your areas of focus.
The best way to set a new goal is to start listing the areas you want to focus on and then develop SMART goals around that area.
For example, most goals focus on health and finances, but you may also want to focus on your career, family, hobby, or starting a business.
2. Create SMART goals.
With your focus area list, you can now create SMART goals for each thing you want to accomplish in the year. A SMART goal is a system of planning that will help you actually reach your target.
We all know that when a goal is too vague, it can be hard to know how to start. So let’s look at a different way of setting financial goals – one that can help you actually achieve them!
S – Specific
Your goals should be specific. ‘Saving money’ is too vague of a goal.
For example, are you saving money for a vacation, for retirement, or to fund your emergency fund?
Be specific about your actual goal, why you want to save for it, how much you will have to save, and how much a month you can save.
M – Measurable
Now that you have a specific goal, you need to find out how you’re going to measure it.
For example, if your goal is financial, look to a free financial app like Apple’s Loot (a 3D money box.) or a habit tracking app like Way of Life.
You can also track your goals in a spreadsheet (Google Sheets are free on your Google Drive, and they can guide you into making your own helpful tracker.) to keep you on track and watch your progress, making tweaks when you’re getting off track.
A – Attainable
We all set goals that might seem like we are reaching for the stars.
It’s good to have aspirations like this, but if you want to reach your goal, you have to ensure it’s possible. For example, if your goal is to fill your emergency fund in a year, you need to run some numbers.
Are you able to save up the amount you need every month to reach this goal, or is this an unattainable number? If you don’t feel like it is attainable, adjust your goal.
Maybe you need to save half of your emergency fund in the year so you can reach your goal.
R – Realistic/Relevant
When setting financial goals, be realistic about what you hope to achieve and make sure it’s relevant.
For example, is your goal something you can actually reach, and is it something that aligns with your personal life?
For example, if you’re planning on making extra money with a side job, do you have the time to take that on? Will you be able to keep your health and relationships in check?
Of course, you want to be able to reach your goals and make sure they add value to your life, so make sure your goal fits your overall life goals. (This will also help to keep you in track.)
T – Time-Bound
When setting a goal you want to reach, it’s important to set a time for when you want to complete it.
Some of your goals can be completed in a few months, while others will take a full year. It’s important to set a specific time for when you want to complete the goal to:
- keep you motivated
- help you prioritize if you’re juggling multiple goals
- make sure you’re staying on track
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Final Thoughts on Setting Financial Goals
The end of the year is an exciting time to set new goals and challenge yourself to better your financial situation in the new year ahead of us.
It’s also a great time to reflect on all of the great things you’ve done and look back on your year.
Using this reflection time can help you gain insights into what went well and what didn’t go well in the year, as well as setting financial goals for the upcoming year.
Editors note: This article was originally published Nov 8, 2022 and has been updated to improve reader experience.
