Annual Challenges

Every year I like to find a few ways to better myself. They are all pretty ambitious but I find even if I don’t complete them getting close is enough usually to provide real benefit to my life. This year is no different. Below are the lists of personal challenges I have set for myself for 2026

1. No buying things – I originally named this no spend but I think this is a better description. I buy a lot of stuff, and too much of it is used a few times then rarely used after so the goal of this challenge is to force myself to resist the urge to buy wants. I’m still allowed to buy gifts for family/friends and books after I’ve completed all the unread books I currently have.
2. 365 difficult – A few years back I did 75 hard and it was a transformational experience. I’ve been wanting to do it again but certain parts of it are just incompatible with my lifestyle now. So the plan is to incorporate a few parts of it into my day to day life. Those are
   • 1 gallon of water per day(I’ll be counting water used for mixing pre-workout and shakes though)
   • 2×45 minute workouts per day(I’ve dropped the requirement for 1 to be outside)
   • Read 30 pages(I read every day so 10 pages was a bit of a gimme)
   • Take a progress picture every day
   • Adhere to a diet(I will be doing a simple calorie deficit until I hit my goal bf% of 15% the switching to a calorie maintenance for the remainder of the year)
   • No alcohol.
3. No Reddit – My reddit account will be 18 years old in May 2026. For the past 10 years if not more I feel like I’ve just used it to get angry and I hate that. I click into threads where I know I will hate the comments, and I regularly visit subreddits full of people I don’t like. I find myself looking back and realising I’ve just wasted an hour of my life reading bad information on topics from people I don’t like just to feel smug. What a waste. I’ve blocked it before but I always convince myself that I need it for when I google a question and all the answers are on reddit but I’ve noticed a lot more often the posts just contain bad information. So yeah, full block zero visits, full year.
4. 2 Side projects live – I spent 2025 bouncing around between side projects. Currently I have two where all the planning is done, they just need to be coded and promoted. So that’s the challenge actually get them released and then work on the promotion side something that I often neglect.
5. Complete my degree pathway – I dropped out of school at 16 to start my first company and never went back. This year I’ve signed up with an Australian uni to complete an online degree….well kind of, since I have none of the prerequisites I’ve actually signed up for a 4 course “pathway” where if I pass all 4 I will get accepted into the full program.

I have a bunch of smaller goals to try and complete throughout the year such as a sit-up challenge but these are my big rocks, the ones that if I even get 75% complete will hugely impact my life in a positive way.