Oooo, me too! I love picking a theme instead of setting New Year’s resolutions.
My theme for 2026 is intentionality.
It feels like a really good fit because it manages to cover a lot things I’ve been thinking about for the last few months. I want to spend my time more consciously, no matter if that’s in a busy way or a chilled way. I want to be more consistent with exercise and studying but also more careful about the media I consume.
Specifically for Japanese, this means focusing on WaniKani and Bunpro for the time being. I have a stack of almost 2k WK reviews to work through so that’s my first goal. I’m not going to aim to complete any set number per day or anything, I just want to make sure I do some every day until I’m at a manageable enough number to start adding lessons again.
The star’s have aligned for me to go all in on japanese . Hence I am going to break The “A “ part of SMART. Either I reach the moon or I crash back to earth.
Read 12 novels and 120 manga: or 24 novels , 10 manga=1 novel.
Finish Steins gate: It has been there in my steam library for months.
Reach 12k vocab on anki: I am sitting at 7.5k vocab
Finish the core 2k Tagalog deck: I really like anki and grammar can be learnt from japanese youtube.
Score great in EJU physics, chemistry and Maths: This year I will be taking it in japanese hopefully.
I will hopefully be in Tjlec by April and before then I have 3 full months of Free time I can spend for studying. My main priority will be to have fun while studying as I dont want to burn out like i did for jlpt N1 last year. And Learning new stuff through Japanese Is really fun.
2025 was a difficult year for me and I don’t think that 2026 is going to be much better until halfway in.
I likely won’t be able to study much, so I’ll focus on not getting rusty and interacting with Japanese material, primarily reading things.
Therefore, my goals are:
Engage with Japanese every day ** Finish the Quartet 1 Bunpro deck Finish a light novel or novel
** For the first goal there will likely a few days where I might just forget, or will be sick or beyond stressed, so I’ll give myself some leeway of 10 days throughout the year here. If I end up not doing anything for Japanese more than ten days in total, I’ll consider this goal failed.
Honestly I just want to keep up with all my daily lessons and reviews on WaniKani, Renshuu, and Anki, while also maybe working out a decent schedule for myself as well instead of just doing them whenever I feel like it.
If I can manage that, I think I’ll end the year a happy customer.
This year I set clear goals which I have never done for the now 10years I have been acquiring the language by being exposed to it mostly (living in Japan or my home country)
A year focused on input and reading quite intensively.
first 6 months : finish 新完全マスター books : N3+N2 文法, 読解, 聴解
(2/3 left to do at this point) + read + wanikani
summer time : pass N2
(took the exam last month already but I have a strong feeling I failed)
last 6 months : read a lot and complete wanikani hopefully by the end of the year.
(I am not sure that will be possible though but whatever the level if I keep my current pace I’ll be satisfied)
the plan is to really free myself from traditional book study before next year and then just get back to input/output more naturally.
Alright it’s public, I now have no other choice than to stick to the plan I guess.
It might not be accurate but I’m equating an entire manga volume with 20% of a 300-400 page novel.
Finish up restarted N2 Grammar and start N1 on Bunpro
Attend 80% of in-person conversation practice groups
2 sessions of 2 hours a month
Attend 80% of 2 separate Saturday online conversation practice groups
Each one is 80 minutes total of focused small groups half in English and half in Japanese.
Some of these are just items I want to continue doing that I started last year or longer ago like the online and offline speaking groups I join while others are making existing habits measurable like giving my reading a number. This list might increase as well. I’m currently going through and making goals for the year and this is what I had ironed out so far.
There’s various Meetup groups that hold events to practice Japanese (and English). Typically they advertise it on Meetup but hold the event on Zoom.
The one’s I participate in are free although they will ask for donations occasionally to support the Meetup and Zoom subscription costs. I’ve only seen it happen in one of the groups, and they apparently hadn’t done it in a few years. Donating is optional though so no pressure there.
Anyone can attend but they’ll typically make sure that your name is on the list of Meetup attendees before letting you into the Zoom room. They have limits on how many can join so that it doesn’t get out of hand so you’ll want to sign up.
There are quite a few with different times and days so depending on your time zone you’ll want to choose one(s) that fit your schedule. I recommend putting in the nearest big city to where you are or other big cities like NYC, Toronto, places on the West US or even some Japanese Cities (Tokyo, Yokohama, Fukuoka, etc.) Then search for English Japanese Exchange, Japanese Language Exchange, Japanese and English, Japanese English, 日本語交流会, and other Japanese phrases. You might try swapping & for and as well.
I am very impressed by the goals of others. You are inspiring me to write some goals as well.
I had the lucky experience last month to study 3 weeks in Japan. I’d therefore like to keep up the momentum.
July 2026 goal - Pass the JLPT N5.
I am currently at lesson 16 of Minna no Nihongo I. I hope to motivate myself to finish the book by signing up to the JLPT exam. I plan to advance by 2 lessons each month and give myself 1 month (June) for exam practice.
Speaking: I will have weekly online group classes on Wednesdays (2h) and I will schedule weekly 1on1 classes (1h) with the Japanese school I attended.
Reading: I have signed up to a beginner book club (“Dino and Gal”) and bought the physical copies. I am looking forward to the experience. Once completed, I’ll join the next beginner book club.
Listening: I’d like to listen regularly to some JLPT N5 content. I will combine it with my gym routine, ensuring 2-3 hours per week. I will focus on N5 mock exam audios because this complements well my study goal.
Writing: I will write my homework of course, but I won’t put any specific focus on this aspect.
Kanji: Daily Wanikani with minimum 5 new lessons per day. I also want to keep the review count close to max 100 to avoid feeling overwhelmed. I experience backlashes whenever I return from vacation mode because I forget so many kanji and vocabulary.
Vocabulary: before my vacation mode I used Anki (Kaishi 1.5k deck). My review pile is a nightmare compared to Wanikani. I will set apart 10mins each day to slowly fight my way through the review pile.
Assuming a successful JLPT N5 in July, in the second half of the year I’d like to join a more advanced class.
Good luck to everyone and have fun with another year of Japanese!
P.S. to my future self: I’d like to purchase the full set of Boku no Hero academia in Japanese. I really enjoyed the anime and would be happy to read the manga. I am aware this is well beyond N5, so I’ve got a long-term goal to strive for!
Completed! First goal of the year accomplished Wohoo!
It went surprisingly alright. Most of the time I did jigsaw puzzle on the floor while listening. Also took a walk once. I ended up finishing the audiobook before I finished the puzzle, now I have to find something else to listen to instead. Audiobook length = 17h 10m. Puzzle time so far = 15h 47m. Only black pieces left. 1000 pieces in total
Oh, that is a hard one with all that uniformish brown color everywhere. I like it if there is at least some gradient that can guide you. At least the border is a little darker to give you probably something reasonable to work within.
It’s a good idea to get some 5k puzzle next birthday again to have something to do. Thanks for the inspiration.
Whoa?! 5000? How much time… Wait, if I spend 15h-ish on 1000, and the bigger the puzzle the more time it takes… 100h+?? And how do you make space for such big puzzle I’d love to see photos!
I did one that almost looked exactly like that (except it was black) with my ex after we basically did every other type of puzzle and needed some endgame.
intentionality
. Hence I am going to break The “A “ part of SMART. Either I reach the moon or I crash back to earth.
I did this one last year, listening to Kanae live stream in the background.
I’d love to see photos!
