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The January spiral is about to begin again: the 6:00 am run clubs, the resolutions announced like press releases, and the planners flying off the shelves. I nearly fell into it the other day; as soon as I heard “New Year”, I rushed straight online to buy a new aesthetic planner to write down everything I *should *be doing in 2026 instead of what I wanted, or how to get there.

This isn’t another ‘January is a scam’ article, or even a call to do more or less. This is about changing how you plan. This column – Modern Balance – is rooted in my belief that the best way to achieve ‘success’, whatever that is today, is by being intentional with where your attention goes. Not because you’re outwardly ‘balancing’ everything whilst internally unravelling into a chaotic spiral, but because you are building systems that support your goals. And yes, it is still possible to have room to be the best, most fun version of yourself.

As a history student, I have learnt the importance of the well-worn line: to plan, you must understand the past

So, what does this look like? Well, in the Working Hard podcast by Grace Beverly (which I would highly recommend), Grace first talks about reflecting on the past year. This may seem a pointless exercise, but as a history student, I have learnt the importance of the well-worn line: to plan, you must understand the past.

She encourages us to answer these revealing questions: what worked well and what didn’t last year? What do I wish I had more time for and what stopped me? Do my goals I didn’t achieve still align with who I am today and what did I achieve that wasn’t on the list? Crucially, she then suggests separating these reflections into two categories: what was within my control, and what wasn’t.

I think this is a genuinely productive exercise. It balances self-compassion with personal responsibility, avoiding self-criticism and excuse-making simultaneously. Each year at University I have felt like completely different people, to the point where my third-year self would barely recognise my first-year self, particularly her decision making. This has come from quietly adjusting how I work based on past mistakes, including prioritising commitments that restore my energy instead of draining it. For example, as my workload has increased, I know myself well enough not to abandon my running or my time with friends. These aren’t counterproductive to my progress; they are what make my work possible in the first place and help make it the best it can be because I am more motivated and creative. What Grace brings to the New Year conversation then, isn’t urgency or reinvention – it is intention, a way of planning that is personal and productive rather than reactive, random, or unrealistic.

Rather than just setting goals, the focus should be on building systems

The next step is to set your goals, but again with intention. Grace groups these into categories such as health, career goals, relationships, and fitness. This is especially important for university students; it’s easy to forget that our lives are more important than our degrees, and sometimes hard to remember that university is just one chapter. But rather than just setting goals, the focus should be on building systems.

System building is something that Rob Dial also discusses on his podcast, The Mindset Mentor, another one I would recommend. In it, he produces twenty-minute short bursts of motivation and advice that usually accompany me whilst running. The idea is that instead of broad goals like ‘eat healthier’, ‘achieve a good grade’ or ‘be better with money’, you design more reliable structures that are more likely to help you achieve these. For example, setting up a daily budget tracker, meal prepping, working out at a certain time on certain days, or doing assignments within a clearly structured schedule.

It is not who you ‘will be’ once you have achieved a certain goal, but a process of becoming that person

Grace Beverly also touches on habit tracking, drawing on habit theory popularised by Atomic Habits by James Clear. There are a lot of useful insights in this book, but what Grace focuses on is replacing desiring that dopamine hit from the result with building measurable, everyday actions that give you small wins and keep you consistent, like ticking off a workout.

This article, I hope, has not been a checklist of things you must do to become a better version of yourself in 2026. It is an invitation to rethink how you approach the New Year altogether. At university, I truly now understand the importance of working smarter and not harder, but applying this logic to planning is going to be extremely useful in not getting burnt out and staying balanced in the New Year. Ultimately, though, this is about falling in love with the process. Progress is the everyday, mundane discipline that you must learn to love to get through it. It is not who you ‘will be’ once you have achieved a certain goal, but a process of becoming that person. This all begins with setting goals intentionally and proactively instead of reactively. I am excited to plan my reset, and maybe I am guilty of falling into the aesthetic ritual of a coffee shop planning session. However, this time I will be planning with intention and systems in mind, focused on what I want to achieve and, crucially, how to achieve it, not what I should achieve according to Pinterest and TikTok.

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