One Idea: This Is Why You Did not Achieve Your Goals This Year
As the year winds down, you will suddenly realize that your goals slipped quietly through your fingers -and that’s exactly the problem: the fact that you’re only realizing it now | Oct 30, 2025| #35|
I. The Idea
2025 is two months from ending.
And for many people, it will end with a long list of unfulfilled dreams.
People who planned to memorize half of the Qur’an but barely made it past one juz.
People who wrote down business goals but never took a single serious step.
People who hoped to land a great job but still have no valuable skill.
As the year winds down, you will suddenly realize that it slipped quietly through your fingers - and that’s exactly the problem: the fact that you’re only realizing it now.
Most people only notice failure after it’s already complete and irreversible.
But the signs were there - clear, loud, and early. You just never paid attention.
Your failure didn’t begin in October. It began in January.
It began the first day you pressed “snooze” on your alarm.
The first night you woke up and scrolled.
The first time you said, “I’ll do it tomorrow.”
The first day you slept back after Fajr.
The first day you planned to study 10 pages and stopped at 5.
The first day you got up and first thing was to go on social media.
The first day you studied on the bed instead of the chair.
Those are the moments your year fell apart.
The problem is that each time you engage in these harmful behaviours, you tell yourself, “it’s just this once.”
Successful people think differently: when they set goals, they don’t just look at the outcomes - they look at the behaviours that will create those outcomes, and once they deviate from those behaviours, they see their dreams falling apart.
If a disciplined student decides to study from 8 to 11 p.m. daily, the moment he finds himself “quickly responding to a text” at 8:30, he sees it as a serious problem.
He knows what it means: his behaviour is drifting. And he knows that behaviours become habits, and habits build or break your life.
When he feels the urge to stop halfway through his planned pages, he recognizes that comfort is winning.
When he thinks, “Let me just stop here. I’ll do the rest tonorrow” he reminds himself - these are the tiny cracks that destroy big goals.
That awareness is what separates those who grow from those who remain the same.
When your focus is only on your goals, you’ll only realize something is wrong when it’s already too late.
But when your focus is on your behaviours, you’ll know something is wrong the moment a little slip occurs. And if you don’t catch those moments, December will simply show you the report.
So as 2025 ends, don’t drown in guilt.
Don’t write new resolutions.
Instead, fix your behaviours.
Action Step
Before you sleep tonight, write down one question:
“What are the three (you can do five or seven) biggest habits that sabotaged my goals this year?”
Overeating?
Uncontrolled use of social media?
Sleeping late?
Then make these three things your not-to-do list for the rest of the year.
And remember - every time you engage in one of them, your goals are dying again.