January Reset: Rethinking Priorities, Uncertainty, and Wellbeing
And an invitation
Happy New Year!
January often brings a sense of reset. For many people and teams, it’s a time to reflect and plan for the next 12 months. Even amid ongoing uncertainty, setting goals is still useful - and not only at work.
If the idea of defining objectives for life outside work feels like overkill or you’re not sure where to begin, here are the top five regrets people express on their deathbed (as per palliative care nurse Bronnie Ware*):
Not living authentically, and shaping one’s life around the expectations of society, family, or peers rather than personal values and desires
Postponing happiness, waiting for the “right time” instead of making choices that create day-to-day moments of happiness
Working too much, and not spending enough time with the people they cared most about
Repressing or hiding their true feelings
Losing touch with friends.
Speaking of uncertainty - it is certainly shaping up as a strong contender for the word of the new year. Unprecedented levels of uncertainty seem to dominate most conversations right now, whether it’s geopolitics, the jobs market, climate or AI.
Prolonged uncertainty takes a toll on our mental health, and limits our ability to engage with life and work thoughtfully, with openness and creativity. In “The Art of Uncertainty: How To Navigate Chance, Ignorance, Risk and Luck” Cambridge professor David Spiegelhalter suggests replacing our vague (and usually inaccurate) intuitions about uncertainty with probabilistic thinking and language. Time to dust off those statistics books, I guess.
Over the next couple of months, I’ll be hosting two free webinars:
Webinar #1: Trauma Awareness for Leaders
📅 Thursday 5 February 2026, 12.30-1.30pm UK (GMT)
Who it’s for:
Leaders at all levels and across industries who are committed to improving their mental health literacy skills, and supporting the wellbeing of their teams.
What we’ll cover:
When and how adversity can lead to trauma
How to spot potentially traumatic responses at work
How to respond to a team member who’s disclosing a traumatic experience.
Webinar #2: Employee Wellbeing: Where Does Trauma Fit In?
📅 Thursday, 12 March, 12.30-1.30pm UK (GMT)
Who it’s for:
HR professionals, wellbeing leaders, mental health first-aiders and champions, coaches and anyone interested in the connection between trauma and work.
What we’ll cover:
Overview of trauma (definition, prevalence, types of trauma)
Why typical employee wellbeing solutions may not meet the needs of trauma survivors
The role mental health allies can play in creating more trauma-informed workplaces.
If you’d like to attend use this form to register.
Evidence-based solutions start with… evidence. Too often people-focused work interventions are driven by assumptions or tradition rather than rigorous insights. The Adversity & Work Survey is designed to generate data directly relevant to leadership, wellbeing and performance solutions by drawing attention to a hidden reality that shapes many workplace behaviours and outcomes, in both positive and disruptive ways.
If you’ve experienced any form of violence, abuse, harassment or otherwise destabilising experience at any point in your life, at work or outside it, please consider taking this survey. Your input helps raise awareness and build understanding in this important space.
Link: https://forms.gle/174jVnD7greckTqE9
A special thank you to Survivors Voices, LinkTech and Restored for their invaluable feedback and support on this project so far.
If you work in the workplace mental health space and would like to get involved, I’d love to hear from you.
Until next time,
Adina
*Ware, B., (2019). The Top Five Regrets of the Dying: A Life Transformed by the Dearly Departing, London: Hey House UK