5 Reasons You’re Not Achieving Your Goals—and How to Fix Them
This is the first post in The Goal-Getter Series—practical insights and simple strategies to help you stop spinning, stay focused, and actually finish what you start.
Good Intentions Stall
It’s late September. For some of us, that means a burst of energy—we want to sprint toward the goals we set back in January. For others, it’s a little quieter: a sense of defeat that we’ve fallen behind, or a temptation to just give up on the things we meant to accomplish this year.
Maybe it’s a bit of both.
Here’s the thing: whether you’re trying to salvage your 2025 goals or start thinking about how you’ll approach 2026, the patterns that derail us are often the same. Over the next several weeks, I’ll unpack the five biggest reasons we don’t achieve our goals—and more importantly, what you can do about each. But first, a snapshot of the landscape so you can see where you might be getting stuck.
1. Too Many Goals, Not Enough Time
It’s tempting to pile on goals. New year, new ambitions, new “better versions of ourselves.” I’ve been there—and I’ve called myself an over-achiever with pride—but the truth is, I’ve learned the hard way that the more goals I juggle, the less I actually finish.
I’ve learned that I make real progress only when I narrow my focus to a handful of key objectives. In any 90-day period, I keep just a couple of major goals on my radar. Everything else? It waits—or it gets dropped. The hard part is letting go of the “shoulds” and the shiny new ideas that distract from what truly matters.
The beauty of narrowing your focus is that it frees up energy. You can pour time, attention, and intention into a few things, rather than spreading yourself so thin that nothing gets traction. In this series, I’ll explore strategies for prioritizing goals so your time works for you—not against you.
2. The Goal Isn’t Clear or Compelling
Some goals are fuzzy. “Get healthy.” “Be more productive.” “Write more.” They sound good—but they don’t compel action. They’re too vague, too abstract, or too distant to actually drive behavior.
A goal needs both clarity and a compelling reason. For example, instead of vaguely wanting to “eat better,” you might set a goal to cook three home-cooked dinners each week for the next month. That’s clear—three meals, every week—and it has a meaningful purpose: modeling good nutrition and creating regular opportunities for family connection. When your goals answer both the “what” and the “why,” it becomes much easier to take action and follow through.
Later in this series, I’ll show you practical ways to make your goals more compelling—so they pull you forward, instead of sitting on the sidelines gathering dust.
3. No Real Plan
Even a focused, compelling goal won’t move forward without a roadmap. I learned this the hard way. I used to write my top three annual goals on the right side of my to-do list, thinking that seeing them every day would keep me on track. Meanwhile, the left side was crammed with daily tasks—emails, meetings, deadlines. Guess which side of the list got my attention? Every single time, it was the tasks with immediate deadlines.
Goals without concrete steps are easy to ignore. Without a plan that breaks your goal into manageable, trackable action steps – with deadlines, even the most motivated person can get lost in busy-work. In a future post, I’ll share ways to build a plan that actually moves the needle—without overwhelming your schedule.
4. No Regular Review
Planning isn’t enough. Without a regular check-in, goals can drift into the background. More than anything else, my weekly review is what keeps me moving forward. It’s when I celebrate wins, course-correct, and identify the next steps. Without it, I’d drift from task to task, feeling busy but never truly making progress.
A regular review is also a mental reset. It gives perspective, reminds you why your goals matter, and ensures your actions align with your priorities. Later in the series, I’ll share simple ways to build review habits that actually stick—so your goals stay alive and actionable through the busiest seasons.
5. Mindset Blocks
Sometimes the barriers are invisible—but powerful. Fear, self-doubt, perfectionism—they all lead to procrastination and quietly sabotage even the best-laid plans.
I worked with a client who had gotten stuck on something as simple as cleaning her apartment, because the problem went deeper. She felt she didn’t deserve a nice space and was weighed down by shame and negative self-talk. Once we addressed the mindset block and reframed her beliefs—shifting from “I don’t deserve this” to “I’m worth it”—everything unlocked. She became motivated to take action, make progress, and see results.
Mindset can be the fuel or the friction in your goal journey. In this series, we’ll talk about the most common blocks and how to spot them early so they don’t hold you back.
Your Road Ahead
Too many goals, unclear goals, no plan, no review, mindset blocks—these are the patterns that derail most of us. The good news? Each one is something you can shift. With attention, intention, and a few practical tweaks, you can make real progress—even in the last stretch of this year—and set yourself up for a more focused, productive 2026.
I’d love to hear from you: Which of these five reasons tends to trip you up the most? Is it juggling too many goals at once, struggling with clarity, skipping the planning step, forgetting to review, or wrestling with mindset blocks? Reply to this post, drop a comment, or send me a message—let’s start a conversation about what’s really getting in your way and how you can move past it.
Over the next few weeks, we’ll dive into each of these five reasons in detail, exploring practical strategies to help you finish strong this year and start next year with momentum.
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