Introduction

Well, it’s been quite the year!  And I’m 100% sure I’m not the only one who can say that.  How has yours been?

So much happens over the course of an academic year – both professional and personal – that it can be tempting to get to the end of it, collapse once the cortisol subsides, complete the burgeoning to-do-list of outstanding tasks, dust oneself off, enjoy a break, and then return to face the mountain again without properly stopping to take stock and smell the roses.

So in this article I am going to do some rose-sniffing (as well as acknowledging some other less pleasant scents that have cropped up along the way), and take a structured approach to reviewing my own personal experience of academic year 25-26.  My hope is that this will model the benefits of engaging in a positive-psychology-informed reflective process, while helping me to process my experiences, extract some useful learning points, maybe experience some catharsis, and hopefully get a mainline injection of that positive emotion that, yes, feels good, but has also been evidenced to broaden-and-build our cognitive and social capacities and capabilities (Fredrickson, 1998, 2005).  At the same time, I’m also hoping that doing so in public might be of help to others, either in terms of you being able to take something from the content of what I’m writing, or perhaps in sparking a motivation to carry out a similar reflective exercise yourself.

My idea for this blog was inspired by Dr Fiona Coley, The Ed Psych Coach (https://www.theedpsychcoach.com/), who at the end of each academic year invites us to take a positive-psychology-informed appraisal of our experiences.  Fi has written a one-side-of-A4 structured reflection tool* that contains various prompts to guide reflection, including ‘Times when I made a difference’, ‘Things I am proud of’, and ‘Most interesting thing(s) I read or learned’, for example.  An end-of-year reflective exercise can often be valuable, and with Fi’s series of structured prompts the embedded positive psychology orientation can steer our attention to some soul-nurturing aspects of our year that might otherwise have got buried in the avalanche of experience.

So, with Fi’s tool as inspiration and guide, here we go with a series of reflections from me about my experience over academic year 25-26.

* The one-side-of-A4 tool is the free version, and you can find that by clicking here.  If you’re looking for something more in-depth, Fi has also written an expanded 'Reflect and Renew' workbook that can be purchased here.  Readers of this article can obtain a £10 discount on the larger workbook by entering the code ASPEN at checkout.

END-OF-YEAR REFLECTIONS

In this reflective exercise, I will cover:

• The most significant change(s) this year.
• Things I am grateful for.
• Things I am proud of.
• Times when I made a difference.
• Times when I felt ‘in flow’.
• Most interesting thing(s) I read or learned.
• People who inspired me.
• Some positive emotions I experienced.
• Three words (and a song) to describe the year.

As usual, we'll wrap up with some summary thoughts and reflective questions.

NB: This isn't a quick read – it’s a long-form article with an estimated reading time of 25 minutes – and I recognise that an article of this length won't be for everyone. Of course, if you do choose to stick with it, by all means break it into chunks as suits you.

The most significant change(s) this year

Right, straight into it, and I’m not starting with an ‘easy’ one.  This prompt is one of the later ones on Fi’s worksheet, but I know she won’t mind me approaching them in an order that makes sense to me and feels right to me – in fact, experienced coach and coaching psychologist that she is, I know she’d actively encourage that.  I think it makes sense from a build-the-narrative perspective to start with this, and then my responses to some of the other prompts will make more sense in the context of my response to this one.

The most significant changes I’ve experienced this year are:

1. October 2025: Further deterioration in my mobility, and an increase in my level of pain, stiffness and disability.
2. January-February 2026: Moving from being a part-time wheelchair user to a full-time wheelchair user (when I leave the house, anyway), and obtaining a suitable wheelchair.
3. January 2026: Being gifted with a renewed sense of vitality and ability to enjoy life and experience after some particularly unpleasant daily symptoms - that I’d struggled with for about 3-4 years – vanished, and have stayed vanished.  I KNOW!!!  More on that below.
4. Finally, a professional one! Across the academic year, Aspen Psychology Services has experienced pleasing growth in our coaching, supervision and training work – the stuff that we’re best at, that uses our strengths, and that enables others to enhance their effectiveness at making a difference.

Significant Change 1: Further deterioration in mobility / Increase in my level of disability

If we know each other, or if you’ve read some of my previous blog articles (you can find the archives on the right-hand side of this page on a desktop, or if you’re on a phone or tablet you should be able to find them by scrolling down), you may well know that since 2008 I’ve lived with Multiple Sclerosis (MS), which started off as relapse-remitting but turned progressive in 2020.  MS shows up differently for every individual that experiences it, and in my case it primarily manifests as mobility difficulties - my left leg is weak and doesn’t move as it should - pain, stiffness, fatigue, some sensory symptoms, and some other stuff that I won’t go into here.  The motor function in my left leg has been an issue for several years now, over which time I’ve increasingly needed to use a stick or sticks to walk even a short distance, and certainly while carrying out school visits.  Nonetheless, I was mostly able to potter around at home without difficulty, sometimes holding onto walls, bannisters, furniture or dado rails as I shuffled myself around.  The observation that we are either disabled or enabled by our environment rings loudly here, as my home was the one place that, often, I didn’t feel like a disabled person; venturing out into the wider world was another matter, which over time led to some shrinkage of my world and experience, but home was a genuine sanctuary.

Then, in October 2025, while on a weekend break away with my wife and our young Jackhuahua, Scooby, I woke up early one morning with increased pain and stiffness in my lower back and even less mobility and strength in my left leg.  Even getting to the ensuite toilet in our hotel room was something I found difficult, and I found myself having to ask Eliza to do even the most basic things for me, like passing me something from the other side of the room.  Yikes.  We didn’t let this spoil our weekend – we certainly made the most of it – but this was a significant change.  Would this be a temporary relapse, or a signal of a longer-term deterioration?  Over the coming weeks, while the degree of impairment did indeed fluctuate, it began to look more and more like a change that was here to stay.  With that acknowledgement came a realisation: My ability to carry out in-person work was going to be adversely affected by this change, and my home - my last bastion of non-disabled life where I experienced the greatest sense of independence - was now invaded by this unwanted visitor.

As well as experiencing the practical impact of this deterioration, there were also psychological consequences.  It took a while for me to become aware of this, but I eventually noticed that I seemed to feel emotionally dead inside, not experiencing feelings or enjoyment in the same way  - even the usual reliable range of anxiety and elation when watching my beloved Arsenal seemed flattened.  Everything felt attenuated, to a degree.  I also didn’t quite feel myself, experiencing low vitality, low motivation, and social withdrawal.  Decisions that I once would’ve made relatively quickly, easily or confidently seemed much harder.  I will return to this theme later, but my response to this change at the time was to ‘mask up’ and focus on fulfilling the roles I needed to fulfil at home and work despite my physical condition and inner numbness.

This story doesn’t end here – in sections below, I will go on to explore how this deterioration led onto my increased use of a wheelchair, the positive impact that has had on my life, and how – with support – I managed to address some of the psychological and emotional consequences of this change; and so, let’s move on to Significant Change 2.

Significant Change 2: Moving from being a part-time wheelchair user to a full-time wheelchair user, and obtaining a suitable wheelchair.

I first began using a wheelchair in April 2025 (you can read more about that and some of the psychology involved in this journey in my September 2025 blog article if you wish).  At first, it was a matter of convenience and ease rather than necessity, making it quicker and less painless to e.g. walk to a local restaurant as a family.  The wheelchair I had was, to be blunt, a dead-person’s hand-me-down, an attendant-only chair (one that cannot be propelled by the user, but only by an attendant helper) that was weighty and not very good at dealing with uneven terrain.  It was clearly designed to be used in hospitals rather than on the mean streets of urban Bristol.  Nonetheless, it was a welcome adaptation at the time as an occasional-use item.  However, as the months stretched on, the reality of using this chair gradually kicked in, especially as I began to need to use it more frequently.  I was dependent on my wife or another person in order to be able to travel, which gradually eroded my sense of self-efficacy and independence.  I was also conscious of the impact of this chair on my wife who, despite managing her own hip pain, had the additional demand of pushing an 80kg man around while trying to walk the dog, for example - which isn’t a straightforward matter in our community given the gradients, pavement cambers and surface conditions in places.  I didn’t want to perceive myself as being a burden, and so I would sometimes choose to remain at home rather than add to her plate.  This led to more shrinkage of my world, and less engagement in a regular well-being enhancing activity (walking the dog), which didn’t help my mood.

The mobility deterioration I experienced in October 2025 further added to the picture, and it became screamingly obvious that I needed to get a better wheelchair for full-time usage.  However, if you’ve ever had to do this, you’ll know that it opens up a universe of possibilities regarding the type of chair you need, and the particular configuration that will suit you.  An initial home assessment visit from one particular provider left my head spinning with possibilities I had to think about: Folding or rigid-frame chair, each of which has their respective pros and cons?  Manual or powered chair?  What sort of wheels do you want?  Carbon-fibre or aluminium chair?  What dimensions do you want the chair to have?  What seating angle?   What seat depth and height?  What size and colour would you like your front castors to be?   It was another world, and one about which I had no idea.  It was bewildering, and it also opened my eyes to the fact that quality wheelchairs do not come cheap.  There was much homework to be done before I could confidently invest in a suitable purchase, and I needed support.

Thus began a journey of discovery involving much internet research, conversations with other people, an assessment by NHS wheelchair services, and a private assessment by an Occupational Therapist.  It was clear that the NHS wasn’t going to be able to provide the specification of chair that I needed, and so I needed to bite the bullet and fork out for a private purchase (it’s quite an eye-opener how expensive it is to be a disabled person in modern society).  Eventually, in January 2026, I made the decision to obtain a Quickie Nitrum Active User Wheelchair, a lightweight chair that would enable me to remain active, but with additional optional power-assisted wheels for days when I’m more fatigued, in more pain, when dealing with steeper slopes, or when I want to power the chair with one hand when I’m carrying equipment for work or taking the dog for a walk, for example.

However, given that the chair would be custom-built, it would take 5-6 months to arrive.  There was no way I could get through that length of time without a wheelchair; a recent school visit to a secondary school had taught me that, in which I had to carry out an assessment at one end of the school, hobble to the other end of the school on sticks to carry out an observation, and then frantically struggle back to the middle of the school when I was desperate for the toilet, almost tripping on several occasions and just making it in time.  This was no longer sustainable.  So, on January 26^th, I bought a relatively cheap off-the-shelf tide-me-over foldable user-propelled chair – a ‘Volar’ - that, while a temporary fix that wouldn't meet all my needs, would at least restore some of my independence and enable me to carry out some school visits more easily.  Equipped with my Volar chair, dog walks with my wife, low-hassle restaurant visits, gigs, football matches with my son, and independent visits to local parks were back on the menu.  Hurrah!  This in itself made a significant difference to my wellbeing and my sense of agency, and it began opening up my world once again.

Then, in May 2026, my Quickie Nitrum was ready for collection.  While transitioning from my Volar chair to the Nitrum has not been easy or straightforward (too much detail to go into here), it has certainly had the desired effect of restoring my independence.  Its functionality means that I can take Scooby for a walk by myself; Eliza and I have been able to go for more adventurous walks, revisiting places we hadn’t been to for years (e.g. Snuff Mills, a beautiful woodland riverside walk in the heart of Bristol); I have been able to independently visit a local pub that had been out-of-reach due to the distance and gradients involved; I have been able to carry out school visits with more ease; I have been able to independently (with the kind help of staff) to do a ‘big shop’ at Lidl for the family (it’s been years since I’ve been able to do this, which has put further demands on my wife); and in June I was able to enjoy seeing The Cure with my family – in comfort - at Blackweir Fields in Cardiff.  These are but a few examples of how the right equipment has opened doors for me again.

Anyway, the chair is a beauty, and here’s a picture of it:

I had originally planned to name the chair ‘The Nebuchadnezzar’, after the ship from The Matrix that flies around freeing people from captivity; but having seen it, it occurred to me that if Batman had a wheelchair, this is probably what it would look like.  So, ‘The Batchair’ it has become.

Significant Change 3: A serendipitous life-changing discovery

In February of this year, a significant positive change happened that was nothing short of life-changing.  I’ve already mentioned that MS has mainly affected me in terms of deteriorating mobility, pain, fatigue etc.  However, since 2022-2023, I have also experienced a number of debilitating invisible symptoms that have made all aspects of life a more difficult experience: A general feeling of malaise or unwellness (I don’t have the words to describe this properly – I just got used to saying I felt ‘MS’-y); a foggy sensation in my forehead; and constant tinnitus of fluctuating intensity.  These were all symptoms that basically affected my experience of everything, draining my vitality, impacting on my experience of the world, and making life much more of a slog.  There have been times when these symptoms flared up to such an extent that they put me completely out of action for weeks at a time; at other times, they remained present but to a degree that I could grit my teeth, roll up my sleeves and push through.  I thought that was my lot for life.

However, in September 2025, as a result of a new lesion on my spinal cord showing up on an MRI scan, the MS team and I decided to change the Disease-Modifying Treatment I had been prescribed since 2021.  This in itself was a complex and time-consuming process.  Everyone who has MS has a different experience of the condition, and everyone can respond differently to the different medications that exist to try to manage it, and so health professionals cannot categorically advise you as to which of the medications might work for you.  All they can do is signpost the options, give you information and answer questions, but the decision is ultimately yours.  Another headspin!  After much research, thinking and discussion, I made the decision to switch from my existing medication (Siponimod, a daily tablet) to Kesimpta, a more potent monthly injection that would destroy rather than simply suppressing some of my white blood cells.  It took a while for the NHS wheels to turn, but on February 12^th 2026 it was time for me to stop taking Siponimod and give my system a break before commencing the new medication.

Four to five days later, my feeling of malaise, the foggy sensation in my forehead, and the tinnitus disappeared.

Newsflash: Those symptoms were side-effects of the previous medication, not simply the ongoing impact of MS as we had all thought.

I was able to experience the world normally again, without the constant weight of feeling unwell and my sensory experience being clouded by forehead-fog and tinnitus.  Yes, of course, I still had mobility difficulties and issues with pain and fatigue; but this whole other stinky, weighty albatross had been removed from around my neck.  I could feel my sense of vitality and alive-ness returning, and I felt renewed, as became evident to those around me.  My wife, who had seen me struggle and deteriorate for the preceding four years, suddenly had her husband back.

While Kesimpta can also give rise to side-effects for some people, I am pleased to report that, at the time of writing, I seem to be tolerating it well.  I have experienced zero apparent side-effects since moving onto this medication (though I have not had to experience illness with my further-compromised immune system yet), and long may that continue.

Despite this gift, what has become evident is that prolonged concentration and sensory input drain my batteries more than they used to, and I have to take account of that in my planning.

Significant Change 4: Across the academic year, Aspen Psychology Services experienced pleasing growth in our coaching, supervision and training work.

I will elaborate on this further in ‘Things I am proud of’, below.

Things I am proud of

• I’m proud of the fact that – with the support of my long-time colleague Dr Jak Lee-  we’ve not only kept Aspen Psychology Services alive, but have in fact further brought to life our vision of shaping Aspen to be a specialist service that focuses predominantly on the delivery of coaching, supervision and training.  Core Educational Psychology work is valuable work and continues to be a part of what we do; however, in academic year 25-26, the provision of coaching, supervision and training accounted for approximately two-thirds of our total work, with the Aspen Psychology coaching and coaching psychology training programme now comprising six complementary days across the academic year.  This is the sort of balance and opportunity I craved when I originally left my Local Authority role so that I could have more control over the nature and amounts of the different types of work I undertake while utilising my specialist skills and experience.  To have been able to achieve that while dealing with the health challenges I have been facing is indeed something I am proud of.
• I’m proud of the blog article I wrote in March 2026 about the toxic masculinity of the Manosphere and, in contrast,  what positive masculinity actually looks like (you can read that article in the blog archives if you wish).  That article appears to have resonated with some people, and it felt important to me to provide my own small counterpoint to some of the toxic online male influencers that are a clear and present danger in our world.  Moreover, I’m delighted that the article has led to a commission for me to support a Multi-Academy Trust in its aims of tackling misogyny and supporting young men to develop positive masculinity, and I am keen to commence our collaboration to make a difference in this area.
• I am proud of the fact that I sought appropriate psychological help when it became clear to me that I needed it (I will return to this theme in ‘Most interesting thing(s) I read or learned’, below).

Things I am grateful for

• The return of some vitality and the return of my ability to experience the world relatively normally following the change of my MS medication in February 2026.  Life and work is not without difficulty, and I need adjustments in a number of areas, but one particularly unpleasant frog seems to have hopped off, and for that I am thankful.
• I’m grateful for the Batchair and my Berlingo, an automatic (and fully electric) vehicle that I can drive with my one good leg and that I obtained in June 2026 through the UK’s excellent Motability scheme.  Both of these pieces of equipment are making a significant difference to my wellbeing, my independence, and my ability to be able to work and contribute to society.
• I’m grateful that I can still work, and that technological solutions exist that mean I can do some of the work I love without placing excessive demands on me physically.
• Finally, I am beyond grateful for the love and support of my wife, Eliza, who walks with me in partnership on this journey as we skid across the black ice together.

Times when I made a difference

• Despite the personal challenges I’ve experienced, I’ve thankfully been able to keep working (with careful adjustments in place, in terms of what I schedule when, the rest time I allow myself, supportive equipment, the relative proportion of work that I do online, and other strategies).
• I am not going to divulge any clients’ stories here, but it has been a pleasure and a privilege to walk alongside people in coaching and supervision relationships, being a reflective guide as they navigate their way through professional projects, casework challenges, wellbeing issues, workplace difficulties, safeguarding issues, organizational-level challenges, and career aspirations and plans, for example.  To know that people have left sessions feeling “buoyant and less confused”, “motivated and excited”, “enthused and optimistic”, and with a sense of direction and momentum is satisfying indeed.
• I have also made a difference in helping participants in our workshops to feel more confident and competent in their own ability to provide ‘helping’ support to others.  As mentioned, academic year 25-26 was the first time that the Aspen Psychology coaching training offer extended to six online workshops,  alongside the three free Coaching Psychology Interest Group sessions that we offer to Educational Psychologists, Trainee Educational Psychologists, Assistant Educational Psychologists, and some professionals in other roles who have found their way to be part of our community.

Times when I felt ‘in flow’

• Again, I need to be careful not to divulge any individual details, but there are some coaching or supervision sessions when we have felt in flow together – where we have been on the same page, co-constructing an understanding of the person’s situation, relevant factors, and how they might move forward.   When this work goes well it can feel like a well-synchronised dance, with each person contributing their respective parts and it all coming together to create an overall sense of connection, movement and momentum to the benefit of the person’s clarity, performance, development, and/or wellbeing.  When I am in the flow, I attune to the person’s situation and listen carefully to what is being articulated (and, sometimes, what isn’t); I am making decisions about when to give space, when to gently enquire, when to validate, when to nudge, when to challenge, when to affirm, and what psychological approaches to call upon.  To me, that’s one of the peaks of professional satisfaction I can experience in my role: applied psychology in action.
• I’ve also felt in flow when delivering training on coaching – another favourite professional activity.  I find it satisfying when, having given people an applied activity to engage in, they return to the main room with their learning points, questions and reflections, all of which contribute to the learning experience that is taking place for everyone in the room.  At such times, I endeavour to respond to those contributions with openness, curiosity, kindness, and hopefully some skill, knowledge and humour, so that together we co-construct meaningful points of learning and progress before moving into the next part of the day.
• Crucially, these moments of flow are information that tell me what I need to be doing more of.

Most interesting thing(s) I read or learned

It has to be this article:

https://khironclinics.com/blog/functional-freeze-emotions-after-trauma/

After experiencing the change in my mobility in October that made it much harder for me to even move around indoors, I went into a state of emotional numbness.  I thought I’d slipped back into depression, as there were some familiar tell-tale indicators – flatness of affect, not finding enjoyment in things I usually do, social withdrawal; it’s a path I’ve been down before, and no doubt will travail again in the future at some point.  I told myself: "I'm depressed".  However, in therapy sessions with Licensed Clinical Psychologist Dr Nicole Pernod (https://www.bristolwellness.co.uk/), we reframed my experience and looked at my presentation through the lens of ‘functional freeze’.

In the article linked above, psychotherapist Benjamin Fry has this to say:

“Functional freeze is a survival response where individuals become emotionally and physically numb, entering a functional freeze state due to being stressed, chronic exhaustion, or unresolved trauma. While externally they may appear functional, internally a person feels shut down, disconnected from their emotions and bodily sensations. This condition is deeply rooted in the nervous system’s response to prolonged stress.”  (Fry, 2026).

Well, colour me in a paragraph!  It was helpful to reconsider the narrative of what was contributing to my presentation, to learn more about and relate to the detail of ‘functional freeze’, and – with Nicole’s help – to experiment with strategies for managing it, including: grounding exercises; movement; exercise; gigs (dancing along to The Cure in Wales while using my wheelchair as a support frame was particularly therapeutic!); and somatic experiencing, e.g. massaging part of my ear.  I am sure this learning will come in handy in my professional life, too.

Another thing I learned (or re-learned) is that our processing of experience and emotion can be a complicated business.  Sometimes, when emotions are painful, we can (consciously or unconsciously) push them down, leaving them unprocessed and unexpressed.  For example, feelings of grief and loss about one’s mobility difficulties and the associated loss of both present opportunities and envisaged futures can be too painful, so we might lock them in a box and bury them.  Then, suddenly, we are moved by some other lived or vicarious experience of grief or loss, even if on the surface it is several steps removed; something - e.g. the film Hamnet, with its exploration of tragic parental loss and grief - touches a nerve, the lid comes off and it all comes flooding out in the cinema!  I couldn’t leave the screening of Hamnet for about twenty minutes after the final credits rolled; I was a complete mess, and not just because of the beauty of the film and performances.  It was at that moment that I realised I needed to seek further support to help me carry the load I had been carrying, and to further process the grief and trauma that can be associated with living with chronic illness.

People who inspired me

• I could list many people here, not least Dr Fi Coley, Dr Jo Taylor, Maxine Caine, Dr David Lamb and Dr Dan O’Hare, all of whom have inspired me with their creativity, fortitude, compassion, aspiration, and commitment to contribution.   I am lucky to know you all, and am thankful to be able to consider you my friends.
• Nonetheless, my main chosen shout-out in this category goes to Dr Cora Sargeant, for being a badass psychologist and total force of human nature despite living with MS and being a wheelchair user herself.  Inspiring through her existence, action, work, contribution, presence, support, honesty, generosity, humour, kindness, and willingness to be open-hearted.  As I’ve said to you privately, Cora: You have been nothing short of an angel to me, and I’m so grateful to have connected with you.  I was very fortunate to find that the Universe put you in front of me when I attended your and Dan's talk on gender diversity at the EdPsy Festival of Educational Psychology in September 2025, and I’m extremely grateful to you for being so willing to connect and share afterwards.  I think we were meant to meet.  One day the Batchair and the Rocinante will roll together, I am certain.

Some positive emotions I experienced

• Love – I feel fortunate to say there has been an abundance of love in both my personal and professional relationships over the last year.  Sometimes it’s the only thing holding me together.
• Elation – At realising the life I had been living with some of the symptoms I had been experiencing was not in fact a one-way street that was going to get worse, but was something that (at least in some ways) was temporary – even if that temporary was four years of hard slog for me and my family.  As the contemporary adaptation of the Buddhist saying goes: “This too shall pass… but fucking hell!”  To come out of the other side of that and realise that new possibilities and pathways lay ahead was truly elating.
• Awe – At the strength and courage shown by my friends and family as they journey through life and face up to its challenges and opportunities.  This blog has focused on my own personal story, but life is hard for many in one way or another.  I have also felt a sense of awe at some of the disabled content creators on e.g. Facebook and Instagram who, by sharing their stories, pain, experiences, and moments of joy, have helped me to embrace the reality of living as a disabled person.

Three words to describe the year

• Wild
• Traumatic
• Transformational

I’m also going to sneak in a song that, for me, speaks to me about both the last academic year, this reflective exercise, and the process of publishing this blog article.  This is Turn Off Your Brain and Yell, by Suede (click here).

Summary and conclusions

This article has illustrated the value of taking a structured approach to reflecting on the events of the previous academic year.  The positive-psychology-informed prompt sheet, developed and kindly shared by Dr Fi Coley, guides us through that reflective process, drawing our attention to positive aspects of our experience while making room for reflection on challenges too.  Indeed, this article and process has become a demonstration in real time that deliberately pausing to notice the good does not invalidate or erase our more difficult experiences; the two sit alongside each other.  “Wild, traumatic and transformational” aren’t necessarily distinct chapters of the last year, but are often the same experiences viewed from different angles at different times.

None of this is wrapped up with a neat and tidy bow – I’m still living with a progressive condition, still experiencing challenges, still occasionally masking up when I need to.  But taking the time to structure this reflection – following Fi’s prompts, then sitting with what came up – has been genuinely useful and cathartic, in the way that I hoped it might be when I began writing the introduction.  If nothing else, I hope it has been useful to you in some way too, whatever your year has held.

Reflective questions

• What's the most significant change you've experienced this year, and what did you learn from it?
• What are you grateful for that you might not have paused to notice?
• Is there a moment this year when you felt genuinely 'in flow'? What conditions made that possible, and can you engineer more of them?
• When, this year, might you have been masking up rather than processing something difficult?
• Who inspired you this year, and have you told them?
• If you had to pick three words for your year, what would they be?

With thanks to

• Dr Fi Coley, The Ed Psych Coach, for generously sharing her end-of-year reflection resource.
• Dr Cora Sargeant, for randomly showing up in my life just when I needed her.

References

Fredrickson, B. L.  (1998).  What good are positive emotions?  Review of General Psychology, 2: 300-319.

Fredrickson, B. L.  (2005).  Positive emotions.  In C. Snyder & S. Lopez (Eds), Handbook of Positive Psychology.  New York: Oxford University Press.

Fry, B.  (2026).  Functional Freeze: Emotions After Trauma.  Retrieved from https://khironclinics.com/blog/functional-freeze-emotions-after-trauma/, Sep 22^nd 2026.