In Which Our Heroine Tries A Different Approach To Planning For 2026

I was reading one of my favorite blogs, From The Pen Cup, and Mary talked about a journaling prompt from The Book of Alchemy. The prompt encourages one to write a “To Feel” list for the year, rather than a “To Do” list.

This really resonated with me. I tend to get very focused on my Tasks and What they are, rather than Why those Tasks are important – which is what I think the “To Feel” list is meant to help one focus on. The Purpose, as it were, that guides what you want to do.

This is similar to other things I’ve read. It might be called “Intention” or “Aspiration,” even. But “To Feel” somehow felt more doable when I sat down to do this.

I made my list. I kept it relatively general and tried not to have too many items on it, as Overwhelmed was emphatically not how I wanted to feel in 2026 if it was at all avoidable.

Here’s what I came up with.

I Want To Feel:
– Prepared
– Organized
– Connected
– Calm
– Creative
– Healthy

I could probably add a few more, but these felt good to start with. Manageable.

Once I had these 6 Feels, I went into Trello and created a Label for each one.

That done, I went through my current Task Lists & assigned at least one Feel to each task. I’m an extremely visual person, and this meant I could see at a glance which Feel each Task was helping me work toward. If a task wasn’t helping me toward any of those feels, I deleted it.

This has really helped me over the past couple of weeks. For one thing, it lets me look at my list of things to do today and notice any gaps. I want to try to make sure I do one task in each category each day.

There are some obstacles, of course. Motivation is something I continue to struggle with, even for things that I really want to do or that I know are good for me. I’m working on ways to break down resistance and remove obstacles in order to make doing things easier. I know my ADHD means I’m living on Hard Mode, so I’m also trying to give myself a little grace.

I read a really great tip Somewhere On The Internet (of course I can’t remember where): People are generally more successful at retaining habits if they add one habit at a time – say, one a month or so – instead of creating a ton of Resolutions and trying to implement them all at once. If one focuses on one habit, it gives one a chance to incorporate that habit into one’s life so that it becomes natural and takes less and less willpower to do. Then, when one adds the next habit, the previous habit needs less focus, and one can devote one’s efforts to acquiring the next habit without dropping the previous ones.

For me, January’s Habit is working on my Italian and building that study habit. So far, I have done at least one Italian lesson in Babbel every day since January 6, which was when I started. With perseverance, I will be able to continue this habit as I add 11 others throughout 2026. (This habit supports my “Prepared” Feel – Alex & I are going to Italy in May with some friends, and I want to be at least conversational in Italian by that time.) I’m feeling pretty hopeful about this one!

What goals have you set for yourself for 2026? Have you ever put together a “To Feel” list? What are you looking forward to? Let me know in the comments.

I know there’s some seriously rough and scary stuff coming at us in 2026, but I also know that there are Bright Sparks in the form of good people and joyful moments. May you have many of both.