Hey Love, 

Welcome to July. I know. What a year. This past weekend I set aside some time to review the past 6 months and to plan for the remainder of 2020. With COVID-19 in full force and racial uprisings across the globe, 2020 has a lot to review and reflect on. So I went to my favorite place, the beach, and sat under the palm trees and reflected. I'm sharing the journal setup I used and some  other tools to help you as well.  




I dedicated a 2 page spread for my mid-year review. I included just the necessary components. My favorite moments, my 2020 to-do list, finances, the next 6 months plan, and a space for reflection. I'm very happy with how this turned out. Just the fact that I remembered to do a mid-year review is reflective of my year. So despite the global unrest, 2020 personally has been a year of great consistency for me; which is always excellent, but especially this year given that my "slogan" for the year is "be consistent".  

I started the year with 13 items on my to-do list. You can consider these "goals", but I found labeling them 'to-do' makes them more actionable. Half- way through the year I've completed about 30% of my items. Looking at this number alone would make it seem that I haven't done much, but numbers are always in context. The image above shows that under the 'to-do' title I divided the items in 3 groups: done, progressing, and needs work. The items in the progressing column are monthly task that come December I can hopefully fully accomplish. The 5 items in the needs work column is where I want to focus my efforts in the next 6 months. These are the things that haven't gotten much attention, or truthfully, I've actively been procrastinating on. We'll see how they develop come December.  

Upon reflection, my year has been far from perfect, which is beautiful; I've never been in pursuit of perfection, simply progress. I'm progressing in ways I only hoped back in January.  



As July begins, I find myself somewhere I hoped to be over a year ago, but under different circumstances. My manifesto for this month, something I've began writing monthly as of June, is to take things easy and as they come. I hope these words inspire you.  




Inhale. Exhale. I hope you allow July to be July.  

Faithfully, 

Marie