Past-Year Review
Mine last year's calendar for what truly gave energy, then design the next
- Difficulty
- Easy
- Time to result
- ~days to results
- Steps
- 5
- Confidence
- 82%
The Past-Year Review is Ferriss's annual planning ritual. Rather than starting from goals, you start from evidence: your own calendar from the past year. You run two questions across it. First, what do I think is productive but actually isn't, catching the calls, emails, and desk-sitting that pass as work but move nothing. Second, what is productive but I don't realize it, surfacing quiet high-yield inputs like reading, long walks, and unhurried dinners with sharp friends that reliably generate ideas and opportunities. You also note how many past commitments now look trivial, and you list the handful of friendships you want to deepen. The output feeds forward: you block the high-energy, high-yield activities and relationships into next year's calendar in advance, so your schedule reflects what actually works.
Origin
Extracted from Modern Wisdom episode 780. Ferriss describes running a past-year review annually to plan the next year and block out protected periods of time.
Core principles
- 01Your own calendar is honest data about what actually drove outcomes.
- 02Productivity theater feels productive but moves nothing; some quiet inputs do.
- 03Ask what looked productive but wasn't, and what was productive but felt idle.
- 04Design the next year around energy and relationships, not just work metrics.
How to run it
- 1
Reopen last year's calendar
Pull up your actual calendar from the past twelve months as the raw data for the review.
- 2
Flag false productivity
Ask what you thought was productive but wasn't, such as low-value calls, email, Slack, and sitting at your desk while not really working.
- 3
Surface hidden productivity
Ask what was genuinely productive but you failed to recognize, such as reading, walking, and short dinners with people passing through town.
Pro tip One steak dinner with a sharp friend can produce ten newsletter ideas.
- 4
Discount what looks trivial in hindsight
Notice how many things that felt urgent last year turned out to have no bearing on where you are now.
- 5
Block the winners into next year
Schedule the high-energy, high-yield activities and the friendships you want to deepen into the coming year, in advance.
In the wild
In his annual review Ferriss asks what he thinks is productive but isn't, listing calls, emails, Slack, and desk-sitting, and separately what is productive but he doesn't realize, listing reading, walking, and brief coffees or dinners with people coming through town. Reviewing the year, he found that steak dinners with friends like Morgan Housel routinely produced ten newsletter ideas or usable life insights, despite never feeling like work.
→ A next-year calendar weighted toward the quiet inputs that actually compound.
Common mistakes
Mistaking motion for progress
Busy calls, email, and desk time read as productivity but often drive nothing forward. The review exists to catch that illusion.
Discounting non-work inputs
Reading, walking, and social dinners feel idle, so people cut them, losing the highest-yield sources of ideas and opportunity.
Is it for you?
Best for
Anyone doing annual planning who wants energy and relationships, not just output, to guide it.
Not ideal for
People with too little history or calendar data to review meaningfully.
From the transcript
“What do I think is productive but isn't, and what is productive but I don't realize it? Two separate questions.”
“So many of the things that I did that had outsized impact was going, Morgan Housel comes through town and we go for steak, and…”
From the episode
The Lessons, Hacks & Books That Changed My Life - Tim Ferriss - #780
Tim Ferriss