“Life can only be understood backwards; but it must be lived forwards.” - Søren Kierkegaard

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Last week I recapped our 10-year Holstee journey and how it has steered us towards a new and exciting project. This week I am thrilled to introduce you to:

Reflection.app — a simple way to start a meaningful reflection practice with an online journal that guides your personal growth each month.

From our Reflection Cards, to our annual Reflection Journal, to the exercises in our Mindful Kits, Mike and I are big believers in the power of reflection. Through reflection, we get the chance to appreciate, learn from, and find peace with our past as we take steps toward the future ahead.

The challenge is that starting and keeping a reflection practice is hard. It can be difficult to know how to begin, and once you do begin, it can be difficult to maintain with all the distractions life throws our way.

For years, journaling has been our go-to tool for reflection. But even when we mastered the habit of writing about our days, there wasn’t an easy framework for looking back on past entries — no guide to help us find patterns in the things that brought us joy, or learnings from the moments that challenged us.

It’s a problem we have experienced first-hand, and after speaking with you, our community, we realized we were not alone.

Two years ago, we began researching, testing, and developing concepts to solve this problem. We have created, scrapped, and recreated dozens of prototypes (“reflectionapp_mockupv10-7a_copy-v2-final-FINAL1.sketch” may or may not be a file on my Dropbox ;-).

Finally, we arrived at a tool that we believe can really help people start and keep a meaningful reflection practice.

Here is how Reflection.app works:

Daily Journaling

Through a simple web interface, you can add daily entries in one of three categories:

• Highlights - Things that brought you joy.
• Lowlights - Challenges you experienced.
• Free Writes - Everything else on your mind :-) (with optional writing prompts for inspiration!)

End-of-Month Review

At the end of each month, you are guided through your Highlights and Lowlights so you can understand how to grow from them. After, you are led through a short self-assessment in six key areas:

• Mind - Do you feel clear-headed, engaged, and intellectually challenged?
• Body - Does your body feel healthy, nourished, and strong?
• Soul - Do you feel at peace and connected to the world around you?
• Work - Do you feel interested in and fulfilled by your work?
• Play - Do you feel joyful? Are you engaging in activities that bring you joy?
• Love - Do you feel positive about the relationships in your life?

Your end-of-month review comes together in one stunning personal monthly report that you can return to at any time.

End-of-Year Review

At the end of the year, you will have the chance to look back on the whole year. Your daily entries roll into your monthly reviews, and your monthly reviews roll into your annual review.

Our goal with Reflection.app is to provide a simple and delightful framework to help guide you through a meaningful reflection practice. A practice that naturally builds on itself by using your entries to guide your reflection, at each step making the next milestone in your life more enjoyable and meaningful.

Ready to give it a try?

Reflection.app is in beta and we will be adding new people every week. Sign up here to request (free) early access!

We plan to work closely with our community to continue making this tool as valuable and useful for you as possible.

Excited to hear your thoughts!

 
Dave Radparvar
Co-Founder, Holstee

P.S. Holstee Members — You will get bumped up on the list once you request early access! In addition, we have also been working hard on some new updates for 2020 and we are excited to share those updates. Keep your eye on the private members group for a sneak peek :-)