The Thoughts That Stayed When the Year Felt Hard
Some years are easy to summarise.
They arrive with neat headlines: “the year everything changed”, “the year it all came together”, “the year of big decisions".
And then there are the other years. The ones that feel harder to pin down.
This has been one of those years for many of us.
A year where you might not have clear answers. Where you feel more tired than triumphant. Where you’re still carrying questions about work, identity, relationships, or simply how to feel okay in the everyday.
When we started the podcast A Thought I Kept, we weren’t looking for big breakthroughs or polished wisdom. We asked a much simpler question:
What’s the thought that stayed with you — when everything else fell away?
As the year draws to a close, those are the thoughts we keep returning to. Not because they fixed everything, but because they helped us navigate life just that little bit better.
Here are some of the ideas that stayed — especially when the year felt heavy, overwhelming, or uncertain.
When Thinking Harder Wasn’t the Answer
One of the strongest threads running through this year’s conversations was the idea that clarity doesn’t always come from effort.
In our conversation with Katie Driver, we talked about how thinking clearly often begins with paying attention, not pushing for solutions. That sometimes the most helpful question isn’t “What should I do next?” but “What am I noticing right now?”
For anyone ending the year feeling mentally overloaded, this idea might help you create space for, rather than force, clarity.
That might look like fewer inputs. Quieter mornings. Walking without headphones. Letting your thoughts arrive without interrogating them.
When life feels hard, this kind of attention can be grounding — a way to feel less lost without needing a map.
Listen to the episode with Katie Driver on A Thought I Kept.
Learning to Trust Yourself Again (Slowly)
Another thought that stayed came up in conversations about self-trust.
Not the confident, decisive version of self-trust we often imagine — but a quieter kind. The kind that grows when you stop overriding yourself.
Several guests spoke about moments where they realised they had been ignoring their own signals for years: exhaustion, resentment, numbness, restlessness. And how wellbeing didn’t begin with adding more practices, but with listening.
If this year left you feeling unsure of yourself, this matters.
Self-trust isn’t rebuilt by grand declarations. It’s rebuilt in small acts:
pausing before saying yes
noticing what drains you
letting your feelings be information, not obstacles
That idea alone — my feelings are trying to tell me something — was one many of us kept.
Explore episodes on emotions, attention and self-trust wherever you listen to A Thought I Kept.
Overwhelm Isn’t a Personal Failure
Overwhelm came up again and again this year. Not as something to eliminate, but as something to understand.
In conversations about work, creativity and leadership, guests reflected on how overwhelm is often a signal that our systems — not our selves — need adjusting.
If you’re ending the year feeling overwhelmed, anxious or behind, this thought matters:
Overwhelm isn’t proof you’re failing. It’s information that’s pointing to too much noise, too many expectations, too little rest, or too little support. And noticing that is already a form of progress.
This is especially important at the end of the year, when reflection can quietly turn into self-criticism. These conversations reminded us that kindness — toward ourselves — is not a soft option. It’s a stabilising one.
You Don’t Need to Fix the Year to Learn From It
One of the most reassuring ideas to come out of the podcast this year was this:
You don’t need to tidy the year up to take something meaningful forward.
You can let it be unfinished.
Many guests spoke about learning through living, not through tidy conclusions. About carrying insights forward even when situations hadn’t resolved.
For anyone feeling lost or disconnected right now, that’s an invitation to stop forcing meaning — and trust that some understanding unfolds later.
Sometimes the thought you keep doesn’t explain everything.
It simply keeps you company.
Keeping these Thoughts Close
As we reached the end of the year, we realised something else: these ideas are easy to forget when life gets loud again.
That’s why we gathered the thoughts that stayed into a printable poster designed by Amanda — a way to live with them, not just read them once. Something to glance at on a difficult day. Something to remind you that you’re not alone in these questions.
You can shop the printable poster here — a collection of thoughts kept from the first year of A Thought I Kept.
And if any of these reflections resonated, we’d love for you to explore more.
Listen to A Thought I Kept — conversations about wellbeing, emotions, work, identity and self-trust, because when the year feels hard, sometimes the most helpful thing isn’t a plan — it’s a thought worth keeping.
