Why Most People Quit Their Goals by February (and How You Won’t in 2026)

Why do so many people feel motivated in January… only to quit their goals by February?

In today’s episode, we’re doing a 2026 reality check - breaking down why New Year goals fall apart and, more importantly, how you can be the exception. If you’re an early or aspiring coach, entrepreneur, or woman who is serious about building something real this year, this episode is your roadmap.

We’re talking about the real reason motivation fades, why willpower isn’t the problem, and how to build habits and systems that actually last - even when life gets busy and excitement wears off.

Inspired by principles from Atomic Habits, this episode focuses on identity-based habits, systems over goals, and designing your environment for consistency, not burnout.

In this episode, we cover:

• Why most people quit their goals by February (and why it’s not a failure of discipline)
• The biggest mistake people make with New Year goal setting
• Why motivation is unreliable - and what to rely on instead
• The difference between outcome-based goals and identity-based habits
• How early-stage coaches should think about consistency and momentum
• Why systems matter more than confidence, clarity, or perfection
• How to make quitting harder than continuing
• The truth about slow growth vs. failure in business
• How to stay consistent in 2026 without burning out
• What successful coaches do differently in the first 90 days of the year

If you’ve ever told yourself:
“I’ll start when I feel more confident.”
“I just need more motivation.”
“I always fall off by February.”

This episode will lovingly call you out - and give you a smarter, more sustainable way forward.

2025 REFLECTIVE QUESTIONS

- What am I most proud of myself in 2025 - even if no one else noticed it?

- Where did I stretch myself this year...and where did I play if safe?

- What belief about myself quietly shifted in 2025?

- What did this year teach me about my capacity - emotionally, mentally or financially?

- What felt heavy this year? What helped me carry it?

- Where did I show up braver that an older version of me would have?

- What am I grateful I stopped doing in 2025?

- What patterns, habits, or relationships no longer align with who I'm becoming?

- When did I feel most like myself this year?

- If 2025 had a lesson or theme, what would it be?

Transcript

0:00

Hello, and welcome to this week's episode of the Building Her podcast. I'm your host, KA Lilian. If you've been loving this podcast, go ahead and rate the podcast five stars and DM me on Instagram when you do that because I want to connect and personally thank you. If you are new here, hit that subscribe button. It really helps the podcast grow, and that way you'll never miss an episode. Hey, my name is Kati Lillian, and I am obsessed with all things mindset, personal development, and helping you build the best version of yourself. I'm a women's life and mindset coach and an entrepreneur who started a fun hobby of posting hashtag sweaty selfies, grew a successful side hustle, and now I run a six figure coaching business. I teach you the secret of building a life that aligns with your deepest values and one that you wake up excited for. This podcast is designed to expand your mind and. Challenge the status quo. So get ready to uplevel your life and let's start building her. It is December 26th. I am recording this live and I am in this energy of reflection. I'm in the energy of what is my vision, what is on my heart for 2026, I feel motivated, I feel inspired. I feel hopeful, and I feel like a majority of you are feeling this. Same way. It's natural at the end of the year to reflect on 2025 and everything you've done and everywhere you've been, and all of the ch, let's call it boxes checked and. Milestones achieved and maybe also the dips and the lows and what we were able to move through. So, that's so natural at this time of year. The reflection, which is also very important by the way, to reflect before you ever move forward and think ahead and set your goals because. Sometimes we don't know what's not working and what is working, unless we go back and revisit and we're like, oh, like this actually didn't serve us or this person, I think I've outgrown this person, or. Wow. I experienced some trial and tribulations or heartache or challenges, and look at how I move through them. Look at how I'm here stronger on the other side of them. So that actually adds to your confidence for when you are thinking about goals moving forward. So. Reflection is a huge piece. If you follow me on Instagram, I publish 10 journal prompt questions for you all. So I'm gonna leave them in the show notes below here as well, so that you do carve out time to reflect before. You listen to anything I say in this podcast because it's all going to be about future goal setting, how to set goals, that kind of stuff. So I think the goal of this episode and what I really wanna get across here is that everyone is in this. Same mindset of, okay, what are my goals for 2026? What do I want to accomplish? But the issue is that most New Year goals don't make it past February. We're all gung-ho. We're all excited come January 1st. I mean, maybe a lot of us are hungover, I don't know. But January 2nd, and we're like, okay, we're gonna get our asses in the gym and we're gonna start this meal plan and we're gonna, you know, walk more and we're gonna show up online and we're gonna. Start that business and then there's this burst of energy and it just seems to go downhill all of January. And then February you throw your hands up, you're like, fuck this. This is why I don't do this. And we go back into the same habits and the same. Patterns. So I'm talking to the early coaches, I'm talking to aspiring entrepreneurs. I'm talking to the women who finally are like, I mean it this time. I'm so fucking serious and I'm gonna make shit happen this year. So my promise for you, my mission for you for this episode is to highlight why people quit. So name the problem, but then also how you can be the exception, how you can now have the tips, the tricks in your toolkit so that you are not going to quit in February. So let's dive in. All right. So. I broke this up into three shifts that you need to make, but before I get there, I wanna just describe again the problem. So why do most people quit? And please be honest with yourself too, as I share all of this. Maybe you can reflect and. M basically call yourself out lovingly and say, ah, yeah, I do that. Number one, the biggest issue that I see is people rely on motivation instead of systems. Now, if you've ever worked with me in any of my spaces, whether it's one-on-one and the big shift, or CEO, you know. I talk about this like it's word vomit at this point. Motivation. The problem with it is that it's fleeting, it's emotional. So if I feel good on some day, I'm gonna be like, yeah, let's go do it. But if I don't feel good on one day, then now my goals, I'm probably not gonna show up for them. Right. So motivation is. Like an emotion. It's very fleeting. It's up, it's down and it's temporary. So it gets really hard to base our consistency and our commitment and our execution based off of motivation alone because we know life gets busy. Energy dips reality. Life throws shit at us. Right reality hits. And so what we want to do instead is create more of a system. And also, if you've worked with me before, you know I love James Clear. He's the human behavior psychologist. He is the author of Atomic Habits and he quotes, he says, you don't rise to the level of your goals, you fall. To the level of your systems. I'm gonna say that again. Maybe write it down. You don't rise to the level of your goals, you fall to the level of your systems. So right there, rising to the level of your goals, that word rise. You need a shit ton of motivation to rise to the level of your goals. You would need discipline, you would need willpower, right? And it's ah, I'm gonna do everything that I can in my power to rise to the level of my goals. But falling to the level of your systems actually sounds much easier and simpler to me because falling means. On the down days, on the days where I feel shitty, on the days where I have low motivation, on the days where my daughter is going crazy and throwing tantrums left and right now my level of. Success is actually baked and designed into systems so that I don't need to rely on my willpower or my motivation. So on the bad days, I'm still moving the needle forward towards my goals. That gives me an incredible amount. Of relief. I hope it does for you too. Number two, you set outcome-based goals only. This part is really important because every client that I've worked with and I've told this to, whether it was in a life capacity or now business capacity, everyone is oh, I never thought of it that way. So instead of setting an outcome based goal, which unfortunately is the standard, they're very common. So for example, I want to make $10,000 a month. Number two, I want 10 clients. Number three, I want more confidence. So those are goals that a lot of people set and plan for. But the issue with that is that there's no plan and no goal set up in the daily behavior, in your identity, in habits that you control. Notice all of those outcome-based goals are out of your control. How in the world are you gonna make 10,000 a month? That's based off of external circumstances. That has nothing to do with how Katya or how you are going to show up. What if you stuck to your goals, showed up every day, all day, and. Did whatever you needed to do and you made 5,000 a month. Well, now it doesn't feel like a win because your goal was 10,000 a month, but you don't see the win that you just made half of that. You see what I mean? You wanna set goals that are based off of. You and what is in your control. Remember willpower fades, decision fatigue sets in. That's a big one. Motivation goes down if it feels hard to do, people stop doing it. 'cause then they assume, oh well this is not right. It should feel easier than this, right? So I'll dive into more like correct goals here in this next part, but I just wanna highlight outcome-based goals. You rely on motivation versus systems, and then again, you underestimate all of the down days, the decision fatigue, when motivation is lacking and when willpower fades. So those are the issues. Now I wanna offer you some reframes, right? So three big shifts for you too. Understand and really utilize as you go and create your goals for 2026. So again, let's ref reference James. Claire. I'm gonna reference him all throughout 'cause he's the best one for goal setting in my opinion. He says, every action you take is a. For the type of person you wish to become. Now, if we apply it to, let's say, entrepreneurship, or for any of my coach girlies out there, you don't want to say, I want to be a successful coach. What you want to say is, I am a coach who shows up consistently because what that does. Is it basically defines and dissects that word successful. I want to be a successful coach. It's like half of you listening to this, don't even know how you define success. Is it money? Is it time? What are your values to be even labeled as a successful coach? Is it truly yours and not? Someone else that you see online, right? So like successful already is very, really have a clear answer of what that is. Now, recognize what that does to your brain too. Your brain is I don't know what to do with this, but if you say, I am a coach who shows up consistently, well look at what you just did. Now it's in your power because it's, you are in control. You have to show up. And then if you show up consistently. Is that every day? Is that multiple times a day? Is that four times a week you set the standard, but now you show up on those days and that is consistent for you? And guess what? What happens when you're consistent? You're probably gonna get more clients because more people are gonna see your content. You're gonna start more conversations, you're gonna have more calls. That consistency. Is the building block towards becoming that successful coach that you desire to be. Right. Other examples I'll stick here specifically to coaches. I am a coach who practices selling. I am a coach who creates value daily. There's that consistency. How often this one is daily. I am a coach who finishes what I start. So if I say I'm gonna, you know, start showing up online four times a week, and I'm gonna do it through the end of January, starting on January 1st. Well, I'm gonna finish when it's January 15th, and I'm like, why the fuck did I set this goal? And it feels hard and I don't like this, right? But it's like, Nope, I committed, I'm gonna finish what I started. Right. So I think for you listening to this, a really good insightful question is like, what kind of coach or what kind of entrepreneur, what kind of person am I becoming in 2026 and. That word becoming is rooted in your habits and your patterns and your daily actions. So what kind of coach am I becoming in 2026 based off of my daily actions? Because remember, every action. You take is a vote for the type of person you wish to become. So this might be painful, but you have to be super accountable and honest with yourself. What am I actually doing? And is it voting for the type of person I want to become? All right. Shift number two, and I mentioned this already at the beginning, but your systems are stronger. Than goals. So goals don't fail, but the way you get to those goals fail, which is your systems. So an example, I want to sign my first client, okay? The system to actually get that done is, I'm gonna post three times a week. I'm gonna start five conversations per week. And then I'm gonna actually practice inviting them to a call and being proactive about it, and not waiting for the inbound, which we all want. Now, recognize that system. Answer the question, is it in your control or is it out of your control? I post three times a week. That's in my control because I'm the one posting and I said, how often? So that's three times a week. So I just have to show up and do it. Starting five conversations a week. That's also in my control. That's me sending a dm, that's me sending a text, that's me sending a voice note, whatever that, communication is, but I'm starting those conversations. I'm also inviting them to a call, and I'm not waiting for an inbound question of, Hey, are you accepting clients? Hey, can I get a call scheduled with you? So all three of those as a part of my system are in my control. What do you think the likelihood of me actually meeting my goal, which is to sign my first client, what is the likelihood of that actually happening? I much higher because the system. That I set is set up to be, it's set up to support that goal, right? It's not about going viral and getting all these followers and all that. Stuff. It's repeatable actions. It's the shit you do day in and day out that will actually create your success. Okay. Another thing James Clear says, winners and quitters often have the same goals. The difference is their systems. Okay. Shift number three, and this is a really good one. I love this example from him, but you want to make quitting harder than continuing and being consistent. So what James Clear talks about in his. Book, by the way, if you don't have the book, I'll link it below. It's really good, a really good like new year read, but he says, and he teaches to make good habits obvious, easy and satisfying while you make the bad habits hard. And there's a really quick example I have, and this is just kind of life in general, but the, it's the one that stuck with me and I think it's in his book. But let's say your goal is to eat better and be a little bit healthier. I would not have a bowl of chocolate bars on my kitchen counter. Because now I just made the bad habit of eating chocolate easier than opening up the fridge and seeing wilted brown lettuce in the back of the fridge, which is the good habit. So the good habit, I want that to be obvious, easy and satisfying. So a quick example is to. Let's go. Say you go to the farmer's market and you buy strawberries and blueberries and apples and cucumbers and whatever else. I go home and I wash 'em and I cut them, and then I throw the strawberries in a bowl. I throw the blueberries in a bowl, like a glass bowl, and then I put it front and center in the fridge. So when I open the fridge, one, they look appealing 'cause they're freshly washed from the farmer's market. Two, it's right there front of mind. So whenever I was about to say Schnick ish, that's German for when I get cravings, so when I get cravings or I wanna snack, I open the fridge. I'm like, Ooh, blueberries and strawberries and what else? Can you cut apples? I guess if you wanted to, but you get my point. They're front and center. You could even have boiled eggs ready to go string cheese. Right. If you go on Pinterest, you'll see all of these very organized fridges and you can buy all these like containers and stuff from Amazon. So if that's something you wanted to do, because one of your goals is to eat healthier, that's what I would recommend. Let's set up the system of your fridge to actually support you getting healthier while you take away all of like your. Baked goods or snacks from, you know, your kitchen counter or your dining table, and you put that away like in the pantry. Right, or save it in the freezer. I don't know. So again, the good habit now is obvious. It's easy and it's satisfying because it looks good and it's freshly washed and everything like that, versus the bad habits, well now I gotta go in the pantry, or I gotta go in the freezer and I gotta heat it up. And now that's hard. Right. The same thing applies to business. How easy would it be if I go back and I talk about the system posting three times a week, starting five conversations, and I practice inviting to calls? Well, you could make that obvious and easy and satisfying by time. Blocking your calendar. So posting three times a week, well, let's pick which days of the week we're gonna post. Is it a Monday, Wednesday, Friday? Is it a Monday, Tuesday, Wednesday? Is it a Wednesday, Thursday, Friday? Right, and then you just stick to it and you time block it on your calendar, make it pretty colors, whether it's blue or green or pink, and you're like, these are my post days, and I'm gonna sit there and I'm gonna have it stack, which means I'm going to apply it to an existing habit like drinking my coffee. I drink my coffee every single morning. I cannot mess up. It doesn't even have to be on my calendar, and I show up for it. So I already enjoy drinking my coffee. Why not? Take a new habit that I wanna start and attach it to my coffee time. So I'll make my cup of coffee. I'll sit down at my computer, open my calendar. Ooh, pretty pink color. 9:00 AM Let's post. Okay, let's get out my phone post. Maybe it takes 15 minutes. And I'm done for the day. I'm done by nine 30, and now I have the whole day to do whatever I want and go back to my normal shit. You see what I mean? That is a good system, and that means the consistency is there. So I think you need to ask yourself, where am I relying on discipline? And will power and motivation instead of a system, instead of design. And then where could you remove any friction? Just like the example I gave you in the kitchen, right? So you could schedule content days, like I just said, time, block it in your calendar. You could have a weekly non-negotiable, meaning like a reward. So I'm gonna post Monday, Wednesday, Friday. And let's say Friday afternoon comes around and I did it and I stuck to it. Well, what is now something that is a weekly non-negotiable where I get to treat myself? Is it a Starbucks coffee? Is it a massage? Is it a manicure? What is it? Reward yourself so that you pair a reward with this activity. So you wanna show up then the following Monday, 'cause you know there's another reward, right? Also, you don't have to do this all alone. It's so much easier doing it with community. Community over doing it alone. I'll take that any day, right? Because being in a room where people understand where you're at, but also they expect you to show up, right? Because they're showing up now. There's a certain accountability to that. Oh my gosh. You're just going to speed up the timeline here. Right. So why coaches quit specifically, or let's say why entrepreneurs quit specifically. And again, I just want this to make you feel seen, not judge yourself or shame around this. Because I've been here co common reasons though are you expect to feel confident before you take action, or you expect to have all the answers before you have any clarity. It doesn't work like that. You have to take messy action first to learn. What you want and what you don't want. That's the clarity. And then based off of your learnings and your findings and your doing well, that's now where you build confidence because you needed to practice courage before you ever feel a little bit of confidence. So you keep expecting to have confidence before you take the action. Also, let's say January 10th rolls around, you started January 1st and you still have zero clients. Well, now your energy starts to dip because you don't get immediate validation, right? Ah, I've been showing up for, you know, two weeks. Why haven't I signed anyone? You confuse slow growth with failure. I didn't sign my first client back with my business coach. I think it took me two months to sign my first client. So I don't know. I would argue at that time in hindsight, my mindset that was slow for me two months. The program was three months long, so after two months I was like, oh my God. I'm like more than halfway complete it. Now. I have a different mindset around that, but at the time that was definitely slow growth for me and I confused it with failure for sure. And then again, you don't have any evidence yet. This is all based off of pure blind faith, so you have to remember that results lag behind habits always. You have to establish the habits first, then trust the results will come. Right? You have to take action before results, or I always say you have to root your win in the. Effort and not the results. Okay, so I think for you, maybe let's give you like three tangible tips here so that you know exactly what to do after this episode, but I don't want you to quit in 2026. So this, these are some actionable tips. So if you've been listening and you wanna jot these down, great number one. You want to shrink the timeline, so don't look at the whole year ahead of you. For 2026, what I would actually recommend is look at the first quarter. Just look at January, February, and March and plan a goal around Q1. That's it. That doesn't feel like a mountain to climb, that doesn't feel like I, you know, have all my shit together for the whole year. Sometimes the whole year is pretty daunting, so what I would recommend is just look at Q1. What is the goal for Q1? And then you could set bite-size goals for the first month, January, and then February, and then close it out in March. So shrink the timeline, make the goal more accessible, and go from there. Number two. Measure your inputs, not your outputs. So this is very sales 1 0 1, but did I show up? Did I post? Did I practice having a conversation? Did I follow the system that I put in place regardless of the results? Right. We're not looking for external validation here, but what we're looking for is, can I do the work that I said I wanted to do? That's the most important part. And the number three, get in the right environment so we know you are a product of your environment. So again, going back to health, if your kitchen is set up in a way to support your goals, then you will be already more than 50% of the way there. The same thing is with entrepreneurship, coaching, getting in the room. You have to understand proximity is. Power habits and patterns are shaped by proximity. You become what feels normal to you, right? And if you're in a room full of other coaches and entrepreneurs who are doing the same shit as you, that becomes very normalized for you, and it feels very. Matter of fact, and you stop self-doubting yourself, you stop questioning yourself, right? Because usually in your real life, no one else is doing this around you. That's why I have my mentorship. I have my coaching containers, I have my community. I have CEO, because I know it's so, so hard to do it yourself. Believe me, I tried for two years and it was just a waste of time. So most people quit by February, but you're not going to do that, right? You're not going to, because now you understand. I'm not worried about goals, I'm worried about my systems, and then also you're going to move in the identity of the person that you want to become. Remember, every action you take is a vote for the person that you want to become. 2026 does not require you to do this huge overhaul and rely on. Discipline and willpower and motivation. It just requires a better system, a system by design that sounds so much easier. Cool. So that's what I got for you today. If anything about this episode resonated with you, please tag me on Instagram. At Katia, Lillian, and I would love to talk about your goals. If there's a goal also where you're just like, I don't really know how to dissect this. I don't really know how to create habits around this and a system around this, then just shoot me a dm. I'm happy to help you if you want any other information also on my coaching containers and what does the availability look like in 2026 and when are we launching and all that stuff. DM me on Instagram, don't be a stranger. I'm happy to give you all the information. If it makes sense, great. You can join us. If it doesn't make sense, great, you can go down another path, right? I just wanna help you, so I love you so much. Thank you for being here, and until next week, bye. let's dive in.