I’ve recently been reading about the power of recaps, so I’ve added a 5-minute ritual to the end of my day to do this.

From author Daniel H. Pink:

…instead of fleeing, we’re better off reserving the final five minutes of work for a few small deliberate actions that bring the day to a fulfilling close…

Making progress is the single largest day-to-day motivator on the job. But without tracking our “dones,” we often don’t know whether we’re progressing. Ending the day by recording what you’ve achieved can encode the entire day more positively…
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On good days, the exercise delivers feelings of completion; on bad days, it often shows me I got more done than I suspected.

It’s on my calendar every weekday at 5:30pm, but it’s not an engrained habit yet. I’m also not great at always ending my day at the same time, so it doesn’t always happen. But I’m working on it! I am noticing that I do feel more closure on the days that I do it, so I intend to try to make this a lasting habit.

Here’s my simple daily recap template. I have it set as a daily note template in Obsidian, my note-taking app of choice, so all I have to do is click the “open today’s daily note” button and fill in the blanks:

🏆 1 win from today

😫 1 point of anxiety/stress

🙏🏽 1 point of gratitude

🌞 Tomorrow, I will…

Do you have a similar daily or weekly ritual? I’d love to hear about what’s worked for you!

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