Finish 2025 with Intention and Focus

We’ve had such a gorgeous fall here in the Midwest that it doesn’t feel like there are only 8 weeks left of 2025. But regardless of the balmy temps, time marches on. If you’re not intentional, you’ll be scrambling at the end of the year to wrap up everything that you need and want to get done.

If you would like to make the most of the last few weeks of 2025, here’s what I recommend you do now.

Calendar for November on desk as a woman flips the page up slightly to add items to the calendar. You can only see the woman's hand and fore arm.

List Everything to be Done Before the End of the Year

Identify Your Must-Do Activities:

Make a list of all of the tasks you need to do, including:

Thanksgiving, Christmas, and/or other holiday prep
Travel plans
Work deadlines
Health appointments
Finances wrap up

Identify Your Would-Like-To-Do Activities:

Make another list of tasks that you really hope to get done but don’t need to happen before January 1, such as:

Home projects
Social plans
Optional work projects
Optional holiday activities

Map Out the Must-Do Activities

Place the must-do activities that need to happen at a specific time directly in your calendar. For example, if you need to prep for out-of-town guests the Sunday before Thanksgiving, block that in now as a reminder.

Any must-do activities that will require a significant amount of time need to find a place in your calendar. For example, an activity that requires a whole Saturday goes in first. (If you’re struggling with having realistic expectations and knowing how to plan out your time, feel free to set up a time to connect with me here: Consultation Schedule)

With the rest of the must-do activities, you have a few options. You could break them down week-by-week now. Or if you find that too overwhelming, just pick a few that you want to work on in the coming week. Find spots for those in your calendar such as a Thursday evening or Saturday morning. Then do the same thing again next time you do weekly planning for the week after that.

Evaluate Your Would-Like-To-Do Projects

If your time is already pretty tight with your must-do projects, you won’t have a lot of time to do would-like-to-do projects before the end of the year. But it’s good to give yourself some space for things you just want to get done.

Each week, look at the list of would-like-to-do projects and see what could be possible. Some weeks, you might have very little time to move anything forward on this list.

But other weeks, you might be able to find a good chunk of time on the weekend or on a few evenings. For me, Sunday afternoons during my daughters’ naptimes tend to be the best for these kinds of activities like putting together our family Christmas card or listening to an interesting training.

Be Very Careful About What You Add

Once you’ve come up with these lists, be careful about what you add to them. Only write down the absolutely necessary items that pop up to the must-do in 2025 list. And even be careful about what you add to the would-like-to-do list.

If your list is already pretty long, you’re better off making a potential items for 2026 list than piling on ideas for the end of the year.

One of the big keys to fulfillment with what you do or don’t do is having realistic expectations of what can fit.

About Real Life E

Elizabeth Grace Saunders is a time management coach and best-selling author who empowers individuals who feel guilty, overwhelmed and frustrated to feel peaceful, confident and accomplished. She helps people struggling with new levels of responsibility after receiving a promotion or becoming a parent, who aren’t meeting expectations at work, or who need better work-life balance to overcome burnout.

Elizabeth was named one of the World’s Top 30 Time Management Professionals by Global Gurus every year since 2018 and is a member of Forbes Coaches Council. McGraw Hill published her first book The 3 Secrets to Effective Time Investment: How to Achieve More Success with Less Stress. Harvard Business Review published her second book How to Invest Your Time Like Money. And FaithWords published her third book Divine Time Management. Elizabeth regularly writes time management articles for Harvard Business Review and Fast Company and has appeared on CBS, ABC, NBC, and Fox.