This December is the last month of the entire decade! Like you I’ve been hearing 2020 primarily related to the Census or Elections, both activities that may feel far into the future. However, in a matter of days, the next decade begins!

• How do you feel about this significant transition from one decade to another?

As you contemplate bringing closure to this decade; as you reflect on the good, bad and ugly, I encourage you to be grateful for it all. With what can we balance the loss of family and friends, homes and communities; virulent strains of racism, sexism, homophobia; rampant gun violence, the criminal injustice system and broken immigration system; the rapid rise in homelessness; impacts of climate change and toxic air, water and land? And the list goes on…

I personally choose to balance it with the fact of women breaking major barriers worldwide; the growing impacts of conscious evolution message of the late Barbara Marx Hubbard; the voices of Speaker Pelosi and the Squad in the U.S. Congress; women shattering the glass ceiling…now all S&P 500 companies have at least one woman on their board of directors; National Geographic’s Women of Impact series, ‪#‎NatGeoWomenofImpact; number of women Democratic candidates for President in the US; https://www.glamour.com/story/women-of-the-year-awards-2019;  younger women exercising leadership in the climate change movement and challenging the NRA in the US; plus young women of color dominating world gymnastics and tennis championships!

• What and Who would you add to this list?

In addition, we’re feeling the positive impacts of the Voices of Indigenous Peoples in the Amazon and their Allies; new financial alliances in West Africa designed to shed the choking yokes of colonialism; and more…

Shifting the focus from the collective to the individual and personal,

• What projects or activities haven’t been finished yet?

• To what must you bring closure by year’s end?

• As you reflect on the year 2019, for what are you most proud or grateful?

In Part II, we’ll focus on:

Developing Your Vision to Thrive Through the Next Decade.

Until then, I encourage you to reflect on your wins and lessons of 2019, or if you’re inspired to do so, your wins and lessons of the current decade, before it ends!

“Take pleasure in your life’s natural unfolding and evolving. Appreciate the challenges and milestones of the journey. Delight in reaching your destiny. Celebrate it all!

-Harriet Tubman Wright