Keep Season: How to Crush Your Goals Before January Even Starts

If you wait for January 1 to change your life, you’re already behind. We’re ~100 days out from the new year, which means you’ve got the perfect runway to build staying power—not just motivation. Around here, we call it Keep Season: instead of obsessing over what to start or stop, we double down on what’s already working and make it non-negotiable.

This post walks you through a simple, skimmable system to get aligned, energized, and ready to hit the new year already in motion.

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What Is “Keep Season”?

Keep Season is a 5-step framework to identify the habits, systems, and commitments that give you disproportionate results—then scale them. It’s the antidote to perfectionism, procrastination, and that “I’ll start in January” spiral.

Goal: Shift from “start/stop stress” to compounding consistency.

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The 5 Steps to Lock In Your Momentum

1) Define Your DESIRES (Exact State)

You can’t scale what you haven’t specified. Write your goals as if they already happened.

Prompt: Define Exact State If Results Equal Success.

• What do you want?
• What does it look like in real life—down to dates, names, numbers, and proof?
• How will you know it’s done?

Pro tip: Keep a running “Exact State” doc and read it daily (I read mine on the treadmill). Clarity is an energy multiplier.

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2) Inventory What You’re Carrying

Before you add, audit. What are you carrying emotionally, physically, and on your calendar?

• List your current routines, projects, meetings, and recurring responsibilities.
• Note how often they occur and how long they take.
• Include “invisible labor” (context switching, cleanup, approvals, family logistics).

Think: This is a time + energy audit, not just a task list.

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3) Measure ROI (Return on Energy)

Create a simple two-column grid and keep it handy for a week.

KEEP SEASON GRID

• Gives Me Energy / Moves Results → Keep, protect, or scale
• Drains My Energy / Stalls Results → Delegate, batch, automate, defer, or delete

Questions to sort the list:

• When I do this, do I leave more focused or more frazzled?
• Does this create compounding benefits (skills, relationships, pipeline, health)?
• If I did 2–3× more of this, would it move the right metric?

Rule of thumb: Keepers behave like assets; drainers behave like expenses.

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4) Align & Schedule the Keepers (in Ink)

Decide—don’t dabble. Once you’ve named your keepers, calendar them in advance and build your support around them.

Examples:

• Weekly yoga class → pre-book 12 Saturdays, prep clothes on Friday, set “leave buffer.”
• Recording days → block film time, hair/makeup buffer, script prep deadlines, upload windows.
• Client work sprints → themed days, no-meeting mornings, shared team expectations.

If it’s a keeper, it earns a recurring time block and gets upstream support (people, prep, buffers) so you can show up at your best.

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5) Lock In Non-Negotiables (Make the Standard, not the Decision)

Choose the minimum viable cadence that guarantees progress without daily willpower.

• “Gym 5×/week” (or your number)
• “Publish 1 video/week”
• “Pitch 3 opportunities/week”
• “Read Exact State goals daily”

Non-negotiables remove the decision fatigue. Consistency > intensity.

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Quick Start: Your 10-Minute Keep Season Sprint

1. Name three desires in Exact State language (present-tense paragraph each).
2. List five recurring activities from your last two weeks.
3. Drop each into the Keep Season Grid (Gives Energy vs. Drains Energy).
4. Choose two keepers to scale and place them on your calendar this week.
5. Pick one drainer to eliminate, delegate, or batch—and write the exit plan.

Set a 10-minute timer. Done is power.

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Examples to Model

• Keeper → Scale: Your Saturday yoga class leaves you sharper for the week. Pre-book 12 sessions, tell your household, create a “no-bookings” rule during that block, and set a Friday night wind-down routine.
• Drainer → Exit: A recurring meeting with no clear owner or outcome. Replace it with a shared doc + asynchronous updates; keep a monthly 20-minute decision review.

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Energy Management > Time Management

Time freedom isn’t emptier calendars—it’s meaningful flow. Keep Season prioritizes the few commitments that energize you and create compounding gains in health, focus, revenue, and relationships. When your calendar reflects your keepers, motivation becomes optional.

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Your Keep Season Checklist

• I wrote Exact State goals and review them daily.
• I inventoried what I’m carrying (time + energy).
• I sorted tasks in the Keep Season Grid.
• I scheduled my keepers as recurring, supported appointments.
• I set non-negotiables (minimum viable cadence).
• I have an exit plan for at least one drainer.

Tape this next to your desk. Revisit weekly.

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Want My Personal Keep List?

If you’re an entrepreneur and want to peek behind the scenes at what I’m personally keeping (and how I structure it for business), DM me “keep season” on Instagram and I’ll send it—no strings attached.

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Final Word

Anyone can start or quit on January 1. The real ones do the work now. Define, inventory, measure, align, and lock in. By the time the ball drops, you won’t be “starting”—you’ll be continuing.

Ready for focused action? Watch the video above, then run the 10-minute sprint and put your first two keepers on the calendar today.