End-of-Year Reflection Rituals for Global Women Leaders
- Florence Kintzel
- Nov 30
- 7 min read
Re-align your inner compass before the next big leap
When you live and lead across borders, the end of the year can feel less like a gentle landing and more like a sprint to yet another finish line.
Board meetings, budget approvals, children's school events, long-haul flights, and family expectations in two (or more) countries. You close your laptop on December 24th and, before the New Year's fireworks have faded, it is open again.
If that’s your reality, you’re not alone.
As global women leaders, we often stay in a permanent “next” mode:
Next role, next market, next posting
Next school move for the children
Next chapter of our lives that somehow needs to “fit” for everyone
And yet, sustainable leadership and a fulfilling international life need more than momentum. It requires intentional pauses.
End-of-year reflection rituals are those pauses. They allow you to:
Reclaim your story from reactive to intentional
Integrate the many identities you hold (leader, mother, partner, daughter, expat, repat, “in-between”)
Honor the emotional cost of constant transition, not just the visible achievements
Step into the new year anchored in your inner compass, not only in external expectations
Over the years, as I moved between France, Japan, and North America, I often skipped this step. I jumped from one project, one country, and one life chapter to the next. I now see that the years when I felt most grounded and confident were the ones when I deliberately took stock not only of what I did, but also of who I was becoming.
Below, I’d like to share a few simple, flexible rituals you can adapt to your reality as a global woman leader. My invitation is not to do them all, but to choose one or two and truly make them your own.
Ritual 1: The “Airport Lounge Debrief”
Many international executives spend December in transit. Rather than resent that time in airports or on trains, you can transform it into a quiet reflective sanctuary.
How it works:
Choose one journey during the month of December: a flight, a Shinkansen ride, a TGV, a long-distance train, and decide that this will be your personal “Year in Transit” debrief.
During that journey, gently ask yourself:
What did I build this year?
Think about projects, teams, partnerships, new markets, new capabilities, or even inner resources you've developed.
What did I protect?
Consider the values, boundaries, relationships, health, and energy you consciously defended — even in small ways.
What did I outgrow?
Notice roles, narratives, habits, or dynamics that no longer fit the leader you are becoming.
It is not a performance review. It is a compassionate inventory.
When I began this practice between Paris and Tokyo, I realized how often I minimized my inner shifts. Like the first time I said "no" to an unreasonable demand, renegotiated an expectation, or spoke with full authority in a room where I would previously have stayed quiet.
Capture your thoughts in a way that feels natural to you:
A page in your notebook
The Notes app on your phone
An email to yourself with the subject line “Year in Transit – [Year]”
Over time, you are creating a private archive of your leadership journey, something you can revisit when doubts resurface.
Ritual 2: Mapping Your Year on “Three Continents”
Global women often live in several worlds at once:
The outer world of roles, markets, and deliverables
The relational world of teams, networks, and family
The inner world of values, identity, and quiet longings
Even if you never left your city this year, you moved through all three. I call this exercise “three-continent mapping.”
Take a sheet of paper and divide it into three zones:
1. Outer Map: Markets & Roles
Where did you operate this year? (Countries, regions, markets, business lines)
Which roles did you hold — both official and unofficial?
Executive, team leader, board member
Mentor, bridge-builder, cultural translator
Crisis manager (often without the title)
2. Relational Map: Networks & Belonging
Who were your key allies, sponsors, and “thinking partners”?
In which communities did you feel truly seen and valued?
Where did you feel like a guest, a “token,” or permanently on trial?
3. Inner Compass: Values & Identity
Which values guided your decisions most strongly this year?
(e.g., integrity, family, growth, freedom, contribution, creativity)
Where did you feel in integrity with yourself?
Where did you feel you had to betray something important — or silence a part of yourself — to keep things going?
When you look at these three maps together, the real story of your year often emerges.
Perhaps you "succeeded" in a market that no longer energizes you. Your deepest growth came not from the big promotion, but from quietly renegotiating boundaries so that your career and your family are no longer in permanent conflict.
As a cross-border coach and consultant, I often see breakthroughs when a client realizes:
“Ah, this is why I feel so exhausted. My outer map and my inner compass have been going in different directions.”
Clarity here is not about blaming yourself. It is about understanding your trajectory so you can orient your next move more consciously.
Ritual 3: A Cross-Cultural Gratitude Inventory
Some may consider presenting gratitude as a cliché. Yet, for international leaders, it carries a special texture.
You move between cultures that express appreciation very differently:
The understated “thank you” of one culture
The enthusiastic recognition of another
The quiet, long-term loyalty of yet another
At the end of the year, try this cross-cultural gratitude inventory:
Identify three people in each “world” who made a real difference this year:
Home/family world (your country of origin, or where your heart returns)
Current country / professional world
“Third space” – global networks, online communities, mentors in other places
For each person, note:
What they helped you with — visible or invisible
How you felt in their presence
One sentence you’d like to say to them if time and culture allowed
Then choose at least three people actually to thank:
A short message
A voice note
A handwritten card
A thoughtful LinkedIn message
Those messages often land at precisely the right moment for the other person. And they also gently reset something in you: a reminder that you are not carrying your international life alone.
Ritual 4: Release & Renewal
Ambitious women are often very good at setting goals. New role. New targets. New country.
Before rushing into what’s next, there is a quieter, essential step: deciding what doesn’t need to travel with you into the new year.
You might like to do this:
At home with a cup of tea
In a neutral café where no one knows you
In a hotel room between business trips
Take two sheets of paper and write on the first one:
“What I’m ready to release from this year”
Let whatever comes, without censoring:
Roles that are no longer yours to carry
Stories about what you “can’t” have as a global woman
(too old, too mobile, too visible, too foreign, too local)
Emotional residue: resentment, regret, self-blame, disappointment
On the second sheet, write:
“What I’m choosing to carry forward”
Here, list:
New skills, new forms of courage, new boundaries
A more precise understanding of how you lead across cultures
A renewed commitment to your wellbeing as a strategic asset, not an afterthought
Some women like to tear or safely burn the “release” list, and keep the “carry forward” list in their notebook or planner for the new year.
The ritual is simple, almost deceptively so. But the inner permission it creates to put down what is too heavy and protect what truly matters can be profound.
Ritual 5: A Conversation with Your Future Self
The end of the year is a threshold moment: one foot in the year that is closing, one foot in the year that is coming. It’s an ideal time to invite the voice of your future self - the version of you who has already crossed your next big transition.
Try this short writing exercise:
Imagine yourself three years from now.
You are in a role, place, and rhythm of life that feels deeply aligned. You’re still living a global life, but with more choice and inner peace.
From that place, let your future self answer these questions:
What did I finally allow myself to want?
What did I stop apologizing for?
What bold decision did I make that changed my trajectory?
Then, let your future self write a short letter back to you today.
No overthinking, no polishing. Just let the words come. Often, you will find that your deepest answers were already there within you, and this exercise gives you a safe space to hear yourself.
Bringing It All Together
You don't need a week-long retreat or a tranquil house to benefit from these rituals. You can integrate them into the life you already have:
30 minutes in an airport lounge between flights
One early morning with a notebook and a coffee
A reflective walk in a city that you know well, but that doesn’t feel entirely like “home” anymore
End-of-year reflection is not about judging yourself or adding one more standard to live up to.
It is about:
Honoring the complexity of your global life
Integrating what you have lived: emotionally, professionally, culturally
Consciously choosing the direction of your next steps
At Global Compass, this is the space I hold for international women leaders:
A place where your inner compass and your outer map can finally be looked at together with clarity, compassion, and strategy. Where your story as a global woman is not "too complicated" or "too much," but entirely welcome.
As you close this year, I invite you to:
Choose one of these rituals
Give yourself the gift of actually doing it
Notice how you feel afterwards: perhaps a little calmer, clearer, and quietly more confident
You don’t have to overhaul your life in December.
You have to acknowledge the woman who has walked through this year across borders, across cultures, across expectations, and offer her a moment of respect.
From that place, your next leap will not be a reaction.
It will be a conscious, grounded step toward the leader you are becoming.
