Running 2026 so it doesn’t run me! [goal bingo template inside!]
By Charity Graham
The entire month of December is full of money spendin’ and party plannin’, all leading up to the holiday many look forward to all year. As December 25th creeps closer and closer, the craze to get the perfect gift and throw a TikTok recap-worthy Christmas party sends society into a candy cane-flavored spiral. Christmas passes, the hype dies down, and now we’ve entered the void.
The 6 days between Christmas and New Year’s Day make up the strangest week of the year, IMO. School’s out, and depending on your job, a lot of folks are still off work. Airports are still hella busy, Christmas lights still light up the streets, and it’s almost an unspoken rule that everyone and everything is operating at 75% because it’s still “the holidays”. Mentally, we’re still recovering from the exhaustive gift-giving marathon we all just endured. So much so, that you have to be uber-intentional about not letting the New Year creep up and find you unprepared.
And I’ll be honest, it almost got me.
Even as I type this on December 29th, I do so envious of 2024 me, who had her resolutions printed out by Christmas Eve last year. Whew, she was on her Zoom! My procrastination comes with a purpose, though! I wanted to share with the masses the non-traditional goal-setting I did last year, how well it worked for me, and give you all a way to replicate the method (Canva template incoming!).
You can scream “New year, new me” until you’re blue in the face, but until you know what you want and identify the steps to get there, nothing will change. For some, New Year’s resolutions have become redundant and lost value, which makes sense if they’re a list of loosely defined goals that end up rotting in your Notes app. By March, they’re gone and forgotten. This was me, year after year. It wasn’t until the last few weeks of 2024 that I decided I’d have to switch up the way I planned if I wanted to see a change in the way I performed. I’d remembered the TikTok trend of people putting their goals on bingo cards and crossing them off as they were achieved. And one thing about me, I love some good ‘ol bingo! So, I got creative on Canva, printed it out, and began 2025 with a bingo card leading the way. Without spoiling it for you, this method was highly effective. I was more motivated to reach my goals and cross those boxes off and, more importantly, it was fun! So, let’s break down how I built my goals bingo card:
Last year, as I reflected on my 2024 and thought about what I wanted to see more (and less) of in 2025, I started with an audit. In a notebook, I wrote down notable events— both good and bad— that happened throughout the year. Accomplishments, failures, things I gained, and things I lost. Essentially, the year at a glance. Take a second and analyze the list, taking an inventory of what you want to stop doing, what you want to keep doing and growing in, and what you want to start.
My 2024 year-end audit! Be nice about my handwriting, the backwards f’s give it character!
From there, I created a few categories: relationships, personal, financial, career, passion project, and physical, spiritual, and mental health. After the audit, I had an idea of broader goals (get closer to God, be more physically active, be more intentional about self-care, etc.) However, on the next page in the notebook, I listed checkpoints under each category. These smaller goals or milestones would mean I was making progress toward those overarching goals. Let’s use intentional self-care and personal growth as an example. On my bingo card, this showed up in boxes as “go on 4 solo dates”, “reach 100 journal entries”, and “read 15 books”. Solid, quantifiable proof that I’ve been spending more time with myself and for myself. Let’s use my passion project (aka Twenty Somethings Media, duh!) as another example. My boxes in this category were things like “host TSM’s first IRL event”, “reach 5K followers on Instagram” (still cooking on this one), and “get a press pass to an event”. Two out of three were achieved, so I ain’t mad at it!
Then came the fun part: assembling the bingo card! I didn’t overthink it, but instead filled out the 25 boxes with all of the goals, only being particular about not putting goals in the same category too close to each other. The cutest tidbit to me was leaving the middle box open for my birthday, my own personal free space.
To help fill the card and increase the odds of getting bingo, I had a few boxes in there that were a bit more fun. Less like serious goals and more like things that would just be cool to accomplish. For me, these boxes were things like doing a split, learning how to do my own quick weave, hosting a themed party, and traveling to a few places. Confession, I’m most upset about not crossing off doing a split, NGL.
My 2025 bingo card, she’s an icon!
The last thing I would seriously recommend would be printing out the card and hanging it up where you’ll see it just about everyday. Especially as you begin to cross off a few boxes, it’ll start to feel like something new to achieve and look forward to is right there waiting for you. Overall, there’s something about gamifying the goals that gives you a sense of extrinsic motivation to get them done.
So now, ‘cause I know you’re wondering about them, the results! Out of the 25 goal checkpoints, I crossed off 10. The ironic part of all of this is that I never got bingo. What I did get, however, was constant reminders and accountability for what I wanted to get done this year, the satisfaction of checking off a box once a goal was met, and a way to track my growth across all these different categories that felt real. This bingo card helped me go beyond my comfort zone. And with over 20 goals to cross off, it also kept me from getting too comfortable— there was more to do.
Thinking about putting your 2026 goals and resolutions in bingo form? I gotchu!
Click here for a Canva template to make your own 2026 bingo card.
Make a copy of the template, and drop your goals in each box!
I’m already proud of you and can’t wait to see you surprise yourself with how you grow in this new year. May it be a year of blessings, big ideas, and bingo!
