We’re a week into September. How are those September goals going?
Maybe you came back from summer feeling rested, energized, and quite sure you wanted to do a few things differently this time. You probably had plans to keep walking in the morning, read more, and spend less time on your phone. You wanted to leave a little more space in your calendar, go to bed earlier, and keep some of that feeling you had when there wasn’t always somewhere else you needed to be.
And then September started.
Work picked up, the children went back to school, and the calendar began filling up again. Everything everyone postponed until “after summer” suddenly became urgent.
If this sounds like you, nothing has gone wrong.
In fact, life may feel very good. Mine does. I don’t want to empty my calendar or make my life smaller. I like interesting work, seeing people, going places, and having things to look forward to.
But this is often the point when the things we noticed over summer quietly begin to disappear.
So perhaps you don’t need a September reset at all.
Before the month gets much further underway, here are seven ways to experience September and the rest of the year a little differently.
They aren’t supposed to be seven more things to add to your already full list. Instead, think of them as things to notice, try, or perhaps leave alone.
1. Don’t Put Everything Back on Your List
Before I left for my summer holiday, I decided to leave my laptop at home.
I still took my iPad along, just in case I needed to work.
At first I wondered if I could leave my laptop at home. What if I needed something? What if something went wrong? Could I really switch off for several weeks without having access to everything?
And then something interesting happened.
I didn’t use the iPad for work either. I didn’t check my data. I didn’t miss my laptop at all.
Of course, when I came home, the laptop went back on my desk. I need it. I like my work. I am very much glued to it when I am not away.
That made me wonder what else we automatically put back when summer ends, simply because it was there before.
Maybe it’s the morning phone check, answering an email or a message immediately just because you’ve seen it. Maybe it’s filling the empty Saturday simply because it’s there, or doing something in a particular way just because that’s how you’ve always done it.
Most of those things may be exactly where you want them.
But before automatically putting everything back, it’s worth asking:
Did I actually miss this?
You don’t have to change anything because the answer is no.
Noticing it is enough. And if you don’t know how to notice yourself anymore because you have been buried under shoulds, this article might help you to start noticing yourself again.
2. Keep One Thing Summer Taught You
What is one thing you enjoyed doing on repeat while you were away? Perhaps you walked every morning while you were on holiday.
Maybe you read in the afternoon, had coffee outside, or slept longer. Maybe you spent less time looking at your phone, or you lingered over dinner.
You don’t need to recreate any of it to feel that way.
A two-hour breakfast on holiday and a Wednesday morning at home are two very different things.
Instead, ask yourself what it was about that experience that felt so good.
Maybe it wasn’t the long breakfast, but it was being outside.
Perhaps it wasn’t the morning walk. It was having twenty minutes to yourself when nobody needed anything from you.
Maybe it wasn’t reading every afternoon. But it was doing something purely because you enjoyed it.
Once you know what matters to you, you have options.
A couple of minutes with your coffee outside with no tech distractions might give you some of what that long breakfast did. A couple of minutes with your new favorite book before bed may be enough to remind you how much you enjoy reading.
Keep the ingredient, not necessarily the activity.
3. Leave Something Off The Calendar
September calendars have an extraordinary ability to fill themselves.
Meetings return to fill up your agenda, dinners get arranged, and appointments that could wait until after summer suddenly can’t wait anymore. Weekends start to acquire plans.
And again, most of those plans may be things you’re genuinely looking forward to. And I am not here to tell you to cancel anything.
But if you still have an empty Thursday evening or Saturday morning somewhere in the next couple of weeks, what would happen if you didn’t fill it yet?
Not because you’ve decided to use it for yoga, journaling, meal prep, or “me time.”
Just don’t give the space another job for a moment.
Leave it as it is.
Then see what you feel like doing when you come closer to it.
Enjoy reveling in the moment and the space to notice what you need. And then simply pursue that desire. You may go out, read, or catch up on something. Or, maybe you do absolutely nothing. Whatever you need, it’s enough.
The interesting part is giving yourself the chance to decide when you get there. This might feel strange at first because we’re so used to being efficient and making good use of our time. But once you resist the urge to fill every small pocket of free time, you may actually start to enjoy the freedom.
4. Don’t Turn Feeling Good Into Another Project
This is remarkably easy to do. The problem isn’t having September goals. It’s how easily the things that made you feel good over summer can become five new things you’re supposed to be good at.
You come home thinking:
- I’m going to continue my early morning walk.
- I’m going to read more.
- I’ll cook more homemade meals.
- I’m going to go to bed earlier.
- I’m going to check my phone only twice a day.
These are all perfectly good intentions.
And suddenly the things that made you feel good over the summer have become five new things you’re supposed to not only do but excel at.
Please remember that you don’t have to prove your holiday changed you into a better-organized person.
And your beloved vacation ritual doesn’t need to become a daily habit to benefit you.
Keep one thing if you want to, or keep none of them for now if that’s what fits your life best.
You already learned something simply by noticing what felt good while you were gone, and that’s enough.
Maybe choose an image you captured that radiates the feeling you’d love to remember and put it somewhere you’ll see it. Let that be your reminder.
5. Notice When Your September Goals Start Slipping
We’re far enough into September for this one.
Is something you came home absolutely certain you wanted to continue already disappearing?
Good, that’s useful information.
Instead of “I knew I wouldn’t keep it up,” try one of my favorite questions: “What got in the way?”
Perhaps your morning walk simply doesn’t fit a school morning.
Or the book you longed to read gets abandoned because by the time you go to bed you’re simply too tired to read a couple of pages.
Maybe the lovely phone-free breakfast lasted only until the first really busy morning, and you had to pay catch-up before you knew it.
None of this tells you that you lack willpower or discipline.
But it tells you something about the beautiful, busy life you’ve spent years building for yourself.
And once you notice what’s going on, you can choose again.
Maybe the walk now has to happen at lunchtime, and you read on Sunday morning. Some days you might look at your phone over breakfast and other days you don’t.
The point isn’t to rescue the habit. It’s to notice what helps and find a version that fits now.
Vacations aren’t meant to be replicated at home, but they can show us what we enjoy once we step away from our usual habits and stop “should-ing” ourselves into doing more.
6. Let Tuesday Be Different From Sunday
This is so important. I have said it many times before, and I will say it again:
I don’t believe there is one perfect routine that works every day.
Different days need different tools.
The long morning walk might be exactly what you want on Sunday and completely unrealistic on Tuesday.
That doesn’t make Tuesday the day you failed at your routine. It just means Tuesday is Tuesday.
Perhaps what helps that day is three quiet minutes before your first meeting.
Or lunch away from your screen, going to bed earlier, calling a friend, or deciding that today is full enough and you’re not adding anything else.
Instead of asking: How do I make myself stick to this?, try asking yourself: What would help today?
The answer is allowed to change.
7. Rethink Your September Goals
September goals don’t have to be about what you accomplish.
Try this instead: When I get to the end of September, what would make me think, “That was a really good month”?
Don’t overthink it.
Maybe you want to see friends you missed over the summer.
Or you want to spend more time outside before the days get shorter.
Perhaps there’s an exciting work project you want to move forward.
You might want to go to an exhibition, cook more often, finish the novel beside your bed, or have a few evenings with nothing planned.
Or perhaps you simply want to feel as though you were there for September while you were living it, rather than arriving at October wondering where it went.
Your answer doesn’t need to be measurable.
And it doesn’t have to sound impressive.
It just has to be yours.
Your September Goals Don’t Need a Fresh Start
You’re already in it.
Work is moving. School has started. Your calendar is taking shape and normal life is finding its rhythm again.
You don’t need to redesign it.
But this is a good moment to notice what summer showed you, what you don’t particularly miss, and what you’d like to experience a little differently this time.
Maybe those are the only September goals you need.
And if something that helps disappears again in two weeks?
You didn’t fail.
But you noticed what happened, and you can come back to it.
And most importantly, you can pick up where you left off because change doesn’t require a new month, Monday, or a fresh start to yield results.
What Might Help You Right Now?
If you’d like to notice a little more, take my free 7-question quiz to discover which pattern feels most familiar right now: **The Constant Giver, The Quietly Depleted or The Searcher.**
Your result will help you notice where your energy may be going, what might help, and the resources I’ve chosen for you.
