TLDR: I set eight goals for 2026 and, as of late September, I haven’t finished a single one. I made progress on all eight, which turns out to be its own kind of failure. My new year goal setting now has one hard rule: five goals, maximum, locked in before I track anything. I cut the goals I’d been ignoring, kept the ones I actually worked on, and moved them into an app I’m building that won’t let me add a sixth.
Progress on everything. Finished nothing. That’s my 2026 goals report card, and I’m writing it in September, so there’s no late season miracle coming to save it.
If you’re about to do your new year goal setting (or you will be in a few weeks, once the guilt kicks in), here’s the mistake I made. Skip it.
Eight Goals and a Notes App
Back in June I wrote about how I review my goals every month. The system was simple on purpose: a pinned note on my phone, a review on the last Sunday of the month, three honest questions per goal. In that post I said I set between five and eight goals a year.
I set eight. Of course I did.
Eight felt reasonable in January. Running a marathon, growing this blog, launching an iOS app, reading 50 books, a lifting goal, and three more I’m keeping to myself. Every one of them was something I actually cared about. That was the problem. Nothing on the list was easy to say no to, so nothing got a no.
Progress on All Eight, Finished None
Here’s the part nobody warns you about. The monthly review worked. I did it. I asked the questions. And every month, every goal had something to report. A little movement here, a little there. Just enough that nothing ever looked dead.
That’s the trap with too many goals. They don’t fail loudly. Each one gets a slice of your attention, the slices get thinner, and none of them gets enough to cross the finish line. Eight goals that are all half done feels productive right up until you count how many are actually done.
The goals I cared about least didn’t die, either. They just sat there. The 50 books. The lifting goal. One more I won’t name. I was ignoring them, and the monthly review let me keep ignoring them politely, because “a little progress” is always technically true.
Most people don’t even make it to my problem. Strava’s data puts Quitter’s Day on the second Tuesday of January, the date its users most often break their streak, and that’s held for more than five years. Planet Fitness usually adds about 400,000 members in January, roughly a quarter of its yearly signups. January is loud. The second week of January is where it gets quiet.
I didn’t quit anything. I just never finished anything. Different failure, same result.
How Many Goals Should You Set? Five.
That’s my answer. Here’s why it’s five and not one or three.
The popular advice goes to the extremes. Habitify argues for one goal at a time. James Clear says to forget goals and build systems instead. Both are fair takes. Neither fits my life. I’m a dad of three with a full time job, a marathon habit, a blog, and an app in progress. One goal would mean pretending the rest of my life doesn’t exist.
Five covers the things that actually matter and is small enough that each one gets real attention. It also changes what happens when a shiny new idea shows up in March. With eight, there’s always room for one more. With five, adding one means cutting one, and that’s a conversation most new ideas don’t survive.
The second thing I’d change is when tracking starts. In 2026 I wrote the goals down and started counting right away. Nothing made me commit to the list first. It was a draft I happened to be measuring.
Where I Landed: Five Goals, Locked In
So I cut three. The rule was stupidly simple: cut the goals I’d been ignoring and had made the least progress on. My behavior had already voted. I just hadn’t counted the ballots.
The cuts were reading 50 books, the lifting goal, and one more. I still read (the book reviews aren’t slowing down) and I still lift. The goals were the part I was ignoring, and a goal you ignore is just a to do item that makes you feel bad.
What’s left: the marathon, growing the blog, launching my iOS app, and two I’m keeping private.
Then I moved them out of the notes app and into the goal tracker I’m building. It’s a local first app for iPhone and Apple Watch, and the whole design is an argument about goal setting:
- Five goals, maximum. There’s no sixth slot. It doesn’t exist.
- Every goal breaks down three ways. Milestones are how you get there, tasks are one off things, and habits are things on a cadence.
- A goal gets locked in before tracking starts. You plan it, you commit, and only then does progress count.
The lock in is the part I care about most. Planning is where you’re allowed to argue with yourself. Once a goal is locked, the arguing is over and the work starts. It’s the difference between saying you’ll run a marathon and paying the registration fee.
The three way breakdown matters too. Something like a marathon splits cleanly: milestones for the big checkpoints, tasks for the one off stuff like registering, and habits for the weekly runs that actually get you to the start line. The habits are where most of the progress lives, which is the whole point of small habits that compound.
Try This Before Your New Year Goal Setting
Before you write a single goal for next year, pull up this year’s list. Circle the ones you actually worked on. Cross out the ones you ignored. If what’s left is more than five, keep cutting until it isn’t.
Then lock it. Put it somewhere you can’t casually edit, tell someone, whatever makes it feel committed. Pick one habit under each goal and start it the first week of January, so you’re already moving when the second Tuesday rolls around (that’s January 12 in 2027). If you want a weekly anchor for those habits, my Sunday routine is a decent template to steal.
Five goals. Locked in. That’s it. That’s the whole method.
