Autumn Inspired Thoughts for the Final Days of the Year  

The days grow shorter. Light filters through the trees at a different angle. Leaves change from green to gold to yellow to brown before softly falling to the ground below. The falling leaves signal change—endings, then beginnings.

As women in business, however, the temptation to mourn a year drawing to a close and all the uncompleted tasks or unaccomplished goals can become overwhelming. Did you plan to find a dream job? Double your company’s profits? Expand and hire more employees? Did you miss your goals, and now falling leaves and shorter days have you worried about an unhappy ending?

The trees don’t mourn the leaves they lose in autumn. Instead they store up their energies to leaf out anew in spring. Here are some thoughts to guide your transition through the seasons…

…Finality
“You rarely achieve finality. If you did, life would be over, but as you strive new visions open before you, new possibilities for the satisfaction of living.” – Eleanor Roosevelt, former First Lady

Even if you think that you have done all you can today, this week, this month, or this year, you can find a slightly different way to try. That old saying, “It ain’t over till it’s over” applies here. While you have breath in your body, there are endless possibilities to move your business and your life forward.

…Ambiguity
“I wanted a perfect ending. Now I’ve learned, the hard way, that some poems don’t rhyme, and some stories don’t have a clear beginning, middle, and end. Life is about not knowing, having to change, taking the moment and making the best of it, without knowing what’s going to happen next. Delicious ambiguity.” – Gilda Radner, Comedienne

Gilda Radner understood the need to embrace ambiguity. She died young from cancer, but she seemed to live and savor the richness of each moment. If you are a woman that strives for perfection, loves to plan and dislikes feeling out of control, stop. Learn to enjoy that unexpected moments provide growth opportunities if you take the time to live in those moments.

…Graceful Exits
 “There’s a trick to the ‘graceful exit.’ It begins with the vision to recognize when a job, a life stage, or a relationship is over — and let it go. It means leaving what’s over without denying its validity or its past importance to our lives. It involves a sense of future, a belief that every exit line is an entry, that we are moving up, rather than out.” — Ellen Goodman, Journalist/Columnist

Cool autumn breezes make some people shudder, not with the cold but from the realization that another year is closing in. They begin to categorize the moments that have passed: good, bad, indifferent. They mourn the loss of passing time and try to hold on for dear life. If this year was an excellent growth year in your job or for your company, celebrate it. If the year brought financial troubles or job loss, celebrate that the exit of this year brings with it the entry into something new, something better and a way to move up.

…Endings
“In the planning stage of a book, don’t plan the ending. It has to be earned by all that will go before it.” —Rose Tremain, Author

Do you read the ending of the book before you start the beginning because you can’t stand the anticipation? Writing a novel is a lot like living life; you cannot plan the ending without the experiences that will come before.

Have you been planning for tomorrow instead of living today? Regardless of the thought you have put into it, it is useless to plan for any ending because you will not be the same person by the time you get there. Life experiences will have left their indelible imprint on your soul.

…Tomorrow
“The most important thing is this: to sacrifice what you are now for what you can become tomorrow.” –Shannon Adler, Author

The tree parts with its leaves in autumn, then rests, knowing that the new leaves of tomorrow, in springtime, will be a glorious replacement for what was here today. Who might you be if you would let go of who and what you are today in order to give tomorrow a chance to blossom?

…Moments
“Breathe. Let go. And remind yourself that this very moment is the only one you know you have for sure.”—Oprah Winfrey, Entrepreneur/TV Personality

The moment you are living right now is the most important moment you have. Each of us has likely experienced the loss of someone or something too soon.

…Evolution
“You will evolve past certain people. Let yourself.” – Mandy Hale, Author

Trees in the forest don’t worry about their impact on the neighboring trees. They do not feel guilty for growing tall toward the sky. Neither should a woman curtail her personal or business growth and success by fretting over the loss of some relationships in her life. You cannot waste time dragging people along with you.

Sometimes, you have to let yourself evolve past people you have help dear. You might love your boss dearly, but after ten years, it is likely that you soaked up everything they can teach you. Move on to bigger challenges but keep your old boss as a mentor.

…Failure
“My best successes came on the heels of failures.” –Barbara Corcoran, Businesswoman/Shark Tank 

Have you ever had a plant that failed to thrive until you moved it to a different location in the garden or into a larger pot? One could view the need to transplant as a failure to thrive in the original environment. Failure to thrive or succeed in one location, or at one job, however, does not indicate that a person (or a plant) will not grow to great heights elsewhere. When failure strikes, look for an opportunity to transplant yourself to richer soil where you can achieve greater success than you thought possible.

…Purpose
“The heat of autumn is different from the heat of summer. One ripens apples, the other turns them to cider.” – Jane Hirshfield, American Poet

Recognize the purpose of your actions, the actions of those around you. If you have found yourself in a phase, at the end of the year, during which your business seems to have lulled, it’s possible that you are supposed to use this quieter time to do something else. Work on that book you keep putting aside. Use the extra time to lay a stronger foundation for the coming year.

…Full Days
“I wake up every morning and think to myself, ‘How far can I push the company forward in the next 24 hours?’”–Leah Busque, Entrepreneur/TaskRabbit founder

True, when autumn strikes, the number of days until the end of the year have dwindled. If you think in days, 60 days until the end of the year seems too few to reach your goals of building your business, finding new customers, or becoming the person you wanted, especially if you have failed thus far. However, 60 days times 24 hours is 1440 hours! How much can you accomplish in 1440 hours? How far will you push yourself or your company?

Transitions are only difficult for those people who put more emphasis on what has passed than what is now or may be in the future. Instead of allowing shorter days, upcoming holidays and the year’s end to cause you to feel rushed, behind the 8-ball or generally doomed—breathe. Savor the season you’re in.