Things I want to do in 2026

Not resolutions, more like how to move the ball down the field

I’m not a fan of New Year’s resolutions. I used to make them, but over the years I’ve slowly stopped. This year I’m focusing on things—positive, achievable things—I want to do more of in 2026. Stuff that excites me and will lead to more growth—personally and professionally—over the next twelve months.

As 2026 looms like a chilling specter ahead, I’ve been thinking about what’s next. 2025 was a—still is—a brutal year for me and my family. We’re not ending the year on a high note, but we’re not without hope for 2026. 2025 was also the year AI stopped being a cute way to do a few things to a tool for solving real problems. 2026 will be about moving from “using the tool” to “building the system.”

Here are a few of the things I really want to dive into next year.

Diving deeper into NotebookLM

Top of my list is mastering NotebookLM. I’ve been using it for a while now, but I know I’m barely scratching the surface. It has so much potential for research and synthesis, and I want to weave it into my daily workflow more.

I learn by solving my own problems first, and my biggest problem is information overload. I want to build a system where NotebookLM isn’t just a place where I dump files, but a genuine collaborator that helps me find the “so what” in the noise.

Things like personal podcast summaries of Substack subscriptions. Better research. Better synthesis. Have it be the place where I have ever-growing libraries of information I can tap into when I need some data points, insights, or just inspiration.

Vibe coding for the sake of learning

I’m also leaning harder into vibe coding. I want to build things that actually do stuff I need to get done. Like the simple tool I built with Antigravity to help my keep my Substack and blog in sync. It’s not fancy, just pulling the content from a post, generating clean Markdown (and HTML), letting me download the images, and paste into the WordPress block editor. Took less than an hour, but is going to save me a lot of copying and pasting.

Next? A Chrome extension. I want a way to send whatever page I’m looking at directly to a NotebookLM source with one click. I know there are already extensions that do this; I already found a few.

But that’s not the point.

The point is I want to learn how to build it myself. There are some things you just need a browser extension for. And when I come across those times, I want to be ready to just to make what I need.

Automating the rote to get more done

I’m looking at creating more complex workflows in Google Workspace. The new tools to string things together look awesome, but I haven’t had something to really throw at it yet. Google has connected Opal with Gems. It’s not available in Workspace accounts yet, but I’m sure it’s coming soon.

I’m working on a way to pull all my Substack subscriptions into NotebookLM to generate a daily audio briefing I can listen to while I’m out for a walk. This is part vibe coding and part automation. I suppose this is more mindset than tooling, but that’s always the start, the right mindset.

I want to build systems that take care of the rote work so I have the mental space to imagine the things that don’t exist yet. 2025 was about doing the old things faster. 2026 is about doing the new things we couldn’t even dream of two years ago.

I’m okay with not knowing exactly how it’s all going to pan out. I’m good with the process.

The “Great Prompt Storage” hunt

I also need to figure out where the hell to keep my prompts. I find or write new ones every day—the building blocks that are foundations for other prompts Right now, they’re in Notion, but that feels like I’m both underusing a tool and at the same time using the wrong tool for the job. I’ve tried Javelin, Ulysses, NotebookLM, and more than a few files scattered about, well, everywhere.

Nothing feels right. Maybe that’s because I don’t actually know what I want the “perfect” system to look like yet. I’ll probably end up doing what I always do: talk it out with an AI until we stumble onto a solution that actually sticks.

Teaching and learning intertwined

One of my biggest goals for 2026 is to help people navigate this transition to AI. I love teaching, especially when it’s something like AI where a lot of people seem both baffled and in awe of the technology. From teachers to students to everyone else, I want to demystify AI and help make it part of their daily lives—just like computers, tablets, and smartphones are.

AI is the tool learn and become familiar with in 2026—and it doesn’t matter what you do, you need to know how to use it. For students, it’s particularly important. Right now they are caught in a Catch-22 of teachers (and schools) trying to keep kids from using it, while it’s also essential they do know how to use it because all future jobs are going to depend on AI as just part of work.

This also gives me a great opportunity to learn more myself. Nothing beats having to teach people something to learn the new skill yourself. If I need to teach people—or build something for a client—that I don’t know right now you can bet I’ll be learning it. Which, actually is something that AI has unlocked for me. When faced with a challenge or new skill or whatever, I often shied away from it. I was afraid of not knowing something, to be a fool or a fraud. And I might have said “no problem, I’ll learn it,” but I wasn’t confident that I could learn it.

Today is completely different. Today I know I can sit down with any AI tool and say “I need to do learn this to do this other thing, teach me” and it will teach meI and I will learn it.

That’s my list—what’s yours?

What’s on your list for 2026? What do you want to check off the list? What’s the goal? Share your goals in the comments and let’s try to hold each other accountable to get there.

Now, let’s get down to business for 2026!

Disclosure: I worked through this post with my AI collaborator, it helped me organize the notes, but the cynicism and the optimism are all mine.