Every year, I write out goals and aspirations for the upcoming year, and every year, I fail them or completely forget about them. Because of this, I hadn’t even bothered to make goals for the past few years. This year, I’m going to try something different, and create more mindful goals for (hopefully) higher success rates.
If you chase too many rabbits, you get none, I decided to frame my goals in different aspects of my life, and tried to choose one overarching goal for each. The categories I chose are: HEALTH, FAMILY, CAREER, LIFE WORK, LIFE, and MONEY. Within each overarching goal, I tried to think up of actionable steps/tangible ways I can achieve these goals (kind of like SMART goals).
Here’s my 2025 recap for those of you who missed it:
Setting goals for 2026
HEALTH: Lose 10 lbs
In the past 110 days, I’ve lost 10 pounds by using a calorie-counting app. In 2026, I hope to lose 10 more pounds to hit my goal weight. But I’m not here to lose weight for losing weight’s sake; I want to build muscle and lose fat.
My Steps:
- Continue using BiteApp to track calories and macros
- Focus on eating a lot of protein and fiber
- Lean towards less processed/natural foods
- Exercise 4 times a week (Personal Training x2, Walking x2)
FAMILY: Speak in Japanese
One of the things I wanted for my kids is the ability to understand Japanese so they can communicate with their grandparents, and appreciate the Japanese language and culture as they grow older. Being bilingual, it’s been difficult for me to not default to speaking to them in the language they’re using because English is obviously their dominant language.
In 2026, I want to focus more on speaking to them in Japanese so that even if they don’t end of learning how to speak Japanese, they can at least hear the sounds, and when they do decide they want to learn when they are older, they’ll have some foundations to give them a jump start.
My Steps:
- Spend at least some time every day speaking to them in Japanese, even if they don’t “understand”
- Read Japanese books to them every day
- Find ways to incorporate Japanese culture into their daily lives
CAREER: Write and Present
My career has been taking a backseat for the past few years as I went through 2 pregnancies. Next year, I want to start things back up a bit with writing and presenting at conferences/events.
- Write 1 blog post a week
- Get a book deal
- Present at 2 conferences/events
LIFE WORK: Find it!
There’s careers and jobs, and then there are “life works,” which I think of as life-long “work” you want to devote yourself to, and may end up being your legacy (paid or unpaid). It should be challenging, engaging, and nurtures your soul/makes you feel better. I’m still not completely sure what I want to devote a big chunk of my time and resources to, so 2026 will be the year I will be trying things and learning more. (Here’s a short page talking about lifework.)
Few ideas I have are: ADHD coaching for young adults, local community involvement, and photography.
My Steps:
- Continue volunteering at the food bank
- Build up ADHD coaching business idea
- Enter photography contests
LIFE: Digital Detox
Social media has had a bind on me for years. Maybe 2026 will be the year I can change my life? We’ll see. I’ve been trying things here and there to try to bring my screentime usage down, and nothing much has been working, so next year, I’ll have to go a little deeper.
My Steps:
- Delete all social media and game apps from phone (done!)
- Limit social media to computer use
- Keep a 9am-9pm screen time schedule on phone
- 1 hour a day on Twitter (I downloaded a browser extension to limit to 1 hour a day)
- Find high quality documentary channels/streams for me to “veg out on” instead of junky videos on YouTube (if you have recommendations, let me know!)
- Read 200 books
MONEY: Spend on values
The past few years have been that money flying out of wallet GIF for our household (yes, I’m mostly to blame). Adding 2 kids is a really good way to make money disappear really quickly. I want to be more mindful about what we bring into the house, and how we spend our money, so this is another pillar I want to focus on in 2026. My goal is to begin donating 10% of our income annually to causes we are passionate about, and that begins with getting our finances in order.
This, I think will be a process, because I definitely get dopamine hits from buying things online, but hopefully with cutting down dopamine hits from social media, I’ll find other ways of entertaining myself.
My Steps:
- Buy mostly consumables
- Think about whether what I’m about to buy will really be as good as I think it will be, or would I rather save that money and donate it/use it for experiences
- Spend mindfully without depravity; I’m not here to become a frugal influencer, I’m here to make sure we are spending money to enrich our experiences or lives
- Buy higher quality food (especially produce), and have kids try different foods even if it costs more
Conclusion
I don’t know if I’ll be tackling all of these at once, or one or two categories at a time, but I hope that in 12 months, at least a few of these goals will be reached! And even if not, if there’s good progress, it’ll still be a win! Most of these are pretty “big” things that have been bothering me, so I hope it’ll be a good year of getting my brain and body back to an equilibrium!