Every year, I try to motivate myself by creating a theme that inspires me. For 2026, I’m going with “The Year of Action.” It’s similar to the Year of Effort I did a few years ago, but I have a lot of goals that focus more on being more active in my career as a freelancer, blogger, YouTuber, author, and home care provider.

I wear a lot of hats today.

Unlike past themes, however, I’m not merely focusing on utilizing my time better. A large portion of what I want to accomplish in 2026 has to do with getting rid of bad habits and creating good, productive ones.

And I’ve already started getting rid of one of the worst habits I developed in 2025: doomscrolling.

What is The Year of Action?

While it’s easy enough to create goals and make challenges for yourself, it’s often difficult to summon the energy to take action. After all, without taking action, those goals are nothing more than daydreams and wishes.

That’s why I usually try to break down how I’m going to accomplish objectives. Not only does it help me stay the course, but I also try to help others build their own strategies for putting in effort.

So, while time management is going to play a crucial role this year, taking steps to make things happen is the premise. In fact, the geek in me has already set up a daily reminder in my time tracking spreadsheet, including things like signing up for more author events.

That’s part of the action I’m talking about. It’s not just making sure I put in a certain number of hours each week. It’s also about applying for scholarships, entering writing contests, marketing my books, and exploring new ways to highlight my content online.

What Does The Year of Action Entail?

Although I have several productivity-type goals set up and ready to go for 2026, there is an underlying theme. As I said, it’s more than just time management or writing a certain number of words this year. A lot of it comes down to stepping outside of my comfort zone and experiencing new things.

It’s all about taking “action” to explore opportunities, not just waiting for them to arrive.

So, what does The Year of Action mean to me?

Yep, Time Management Kicks it Off

Obviously, being able to manage my time better is the first step. In 2025, I was working on The Year of Time. And although I did spend slightly more time working on various projects throughout the year than I did in 2024, I’ve realized I still have a long way to go.

Because I track everything I do in a spreadsheet, I know exactly where I waste time. Yes, there are days when the chaos is dialed to 11, and I am running around trying to keep the house together. But there are times when some bad habits kick in and chew up what time I have left.

Think about it; I am a part-time freelancer, part-time home care provider, and part-time student. I don’t have a lot of time left over for blogging, writing books, or making videos. Spending an hour or so getting sucked into dark YouTube rabbit holes is not helpful.

Anyway, I’m going to continue working on time management skills and aim to break my record this year for time spent working on projects. My best year was in 2021, the year I published A Freelancer’s Tale.

Breaking a Few More Bad Habits

I’ve already brought up a couple of bad habits that were melting a lot of time in 2025: doomscrolling and YouTube rabbit hole spelunking. But those aren’t the only ones I’ve developed recently that are holding me back.

Another bad habit is how I’ll “work” for about 20 minutes, and then take a 30-minute break. It doesn’t take long to see just how much time I’m eating away.

Now, don’t get me wrong. Having breaks throughout the day can help keep you from getting stabby. It’s when those breaks become excessive that create a problem when you’re working from home.

I also have a bit of an issue with procrastination. It’s why a lot of things haven’t been done on the YouTube channel lately and why I’ve only published a single book in two years.

Building Brands, Including Myself

A few life situations have prompted me to put more effort into building up my various brands, including myself. In the past, I would try to handle all of this on my own. However, this time, I am involving others who want to help.

Plus, I might be able to afford hiring another writer here and there each month. So, not all of the content creation is going to sit on my shoulders. Well, it probably will for the first few weeks until we get into our groove. But I’m going to explore incorporating more people into the team.

It’s not just the blogs and YouTube channels I’m focusing on. I also need to continue working on myself as a brand – mostly as an author.

Some of that has to do with self-doubt. Usually, I’ll look at an opportunity and think, “Why me?” Essentially, I talk myself out of trying something because I don’t think I have the necessary skillset or ability, which is often not the case. The mindset isn’t as bad as it was back in 2016, but those thoughts are still there in some capacity.

Going Beyond Just Survival Mode

I’ve been in survival mode for far too long. While I can keep the bills paid and have a few extra bucks each month, I can’t sustain an emergency, which happens a lot in this house. I’m able to juggle a few things so we don’t go under, but I’d like to be able to afford the occasional hospital visit or medical treatments.

The health care system in the United States is a joke.

Anyway, things here in the background require a bit more than I am making today. So, I need to go beyond survival mode. And a lot of that means dealing with procrastination and putting forth the action to make things happen.

Over the last couple of weeks, I’ve been doing pretty well at taking steps to see things through. I just need to carry that motivation into the new year.

Setting Up a Goal Checklist for 2026

For The Year of Action, I’ve decided to create a checklist of goals. That way, anyone who visits the site can see my progress throughout the year. I’ll have a brief description regarding how I plan to take action to meet each one.

This checklist will probably be a work in progress throughout the entire year. I’m sure I’ll add more as opportunities come up or if I think of something new I’d like to try.

The primary idea for this checklist is to help keep me motivated. It’ll constantly be loaded up in my browser as a reminder that I want to take action to make better things happen here at the house. It might sound a bit dorky to some, but if it helps me stay focused, that’s all that really matters in the end.

The checklist will look a bit like this:

This is easy to set up if you’d like to make one of your own. It’s actually the To Do list template in Google Sheets.

Let’s Get Some Things Done This Year!

Yes, I have quite a bit on my plate. However, I am relatively confident that I can meet all of my goals, as long as I keep putting in the action to see my plans through to the end.

There are a lot of great things that can happen, as long as I stop procrastinating or getting lost in random social media rabbit holes.

The silly thing is that I’ve known what needs to be done for a decade. In The Year of Action, I’m going to put in the same care and devotion for myself as I have for all of my clients. Let’s see if the results will be similar by the end of the year.

Multiplying the traffic to the blogs and YouTube channels by 10 would be amazing. Yes, that is what I did for one of my clients…twice.