First day of the year, which means another year, another chance to grow. At least
that's what I told myself last year, and the year before, and the year before last, the list goes on and on.

A lot of things had changed for the past year, I learn a lot of things from ticketing management to cloud computing and data analytics. I've also dive deeper into how machine learning works by building tools that will assist me in my daily life and projects that push my limits.

Although I build a lot of stuff such as AI models for image classification, transcribing models, or even voice clonning but somehow deep in my heart I feel "empty", and if you ask me what had I really accomplished in the year 2026, I can only remember tickets, and maybe some cloud computing concepts.

"But why? Why can't you remember them?".

That's what I have asked myself when I wrote this blog, I tried to investigate what could caused that issue, maybe I'm too busy on doing other things that I slowly forgotten it? Maybe my memories are fading? They couldn't possibly be the cause! Since I can remember stuffs from years ago clearly, it really falls onto whether I want to remember them or not.

And that's when I realise something, I'm chasing too much things at once. If you have visited my github (some shameless self-promotion here) before I hide and deleted some of the repos that I have created from the past few years. You can find public repos such as "transscribe_llm", "summarise_docs", "rag_llm", "price_prediction" and so on. They look "colourful", but honestly I have no idea what I have done in each of them, and most of the time after completing these projects I straight up forget about them and just upload them to my github for the sake of filling up my greeneries (if you know what I meant, it's the contributions in github).

And that's where it struck me, I'm chasing for too much too soon. I tried to potray myself as a person who's willing to learn and do anything. But as a normal human being, I'm not a person that can do anything perfectly and requires good honing over the year to become good at something, but as one said before, "Our Imperfections Makes Us Unique and Also Beautiful".

As I'm sitting in my seat and planning for 2026, I've decided that I shouldn't be chasing fancy and shiny thing anymore. But rather focus on what I truly liked.

So... What Matters Most in 2026?

Looking ahead, three things comes into my mind first:

1. A stable career that develops my skills
Not just any job, but rather somewhere I can truly grow, learn, and meet new peoples. Especially with the rapid advancement of AI technology. I really couldn't just sit down and relax. Staying technically sharp isn't optional anymore, it's a must, especially if I'm planning to stay in the technology industry.

2. Time with family (really important!)
When I finally get my first job after graduating university, I lost both of my grandmothers in the same week. At first when I travel back for the two funerals, I wasn't feeling anything, for me it was all part of nature's law, people died, but too were people born. It's a cycle where each generations strive to make the world a better place for their childrens.

But every night when I saw the pillow my grandmother made for me, I feel somethings off. It all seems like a bad dream and I can meet my grandparents again when I have time to go back to my hometown. Unfortunately, everything is real, too real.

My parents are getting old, and heck, I'm getting old too! I'm not in the nostalgic dreams where I'm still a child in primary school, where everything is moving slow, metaphorically. Time waits for no one and it's too easy to get lost in work, I have to acknowledge this, even though it's hard to accept it.

3. Staying relevant in a rapidly evolving world
AI tools are getting better and better every day, yesterday ChatGPT came out, and then tomorrow they think AGI is achieved [1]. Fun Prank: Make people study for 16 years then replace them with AI.

The Hard Truth About My 2025

I have to be honest: I'm really afraid that I become obsolete.

As AI are getting more capable each day, I really can't being myself being too comfortable with my life if I'm not hardworking enough to keep myself relevant, and... needed. With all sort of news about entry level jobs are dying [2] and I'd just performed my first step in my entire career. I'm really worried about how my future, and the world's future will path towards (please stop asking me "Where Do You See Yourself in 5 Years?", if I know I had already go for stock trading already!).

The anxiety of being replace, is it a healthy emotion? Or is it a dangerous emotion that triggers my oldest and strongest emotion of fear? Which being the fear of unknown.

But alas, it's pointless to think so much where we should we living in the present. Let's put fear aside for a moment, and keep improving ourselves.

Did I Got Anything Right in 2025?...

Well, some of them worked, and I need to acknowledge those:

Independence

I took time to learn being independent. To be free from external source of influence. It's not easy to do it, but I'm trying my best. Where's the fun in attemping something without failure right?

No more concerning about "Will I offend people if I rejected them?" or "I feel like I need to appease everyone".

I've stopped trying to get permission or wait for the perfect conditions, I just followed my heart, and do whatever I wished, legal stuffs only of course.

Jack of All Trades, or Master of None?

In the year 2025, and the years before it. I chased too many projects, spent my time here and there. It's nothing wrong being wanting to learn everything when I can, but to learn everything without really understanding it makes a huge difference. I can learn machine learning, animations, software engineering, hardware designing, concrete mixing, and anything I want, but am I useful if I'm trying to present them as my core skills? When I can't even answer some deeper questions in each sectors?

So instead of chasing projects just because they looked fun. Instead I try to ask myself "Is this sudden surge of fondness towards this project your impulse? Or you are genuinely thinking it will help you in the future?".

Staying calm and ask myself a few question before I commit to do anything allows me to filter out things I really need from things I want. That's why instead of developing 20+ small projects, I only created (and still continue improving) 1 major project, which is my personal website (surely you are on it right!).

This is where I had honed my web design, web hosting, development lifecycle, linux, etc, skills that I will truly appreciate. Everytime I visited my own website, I feel as proud as a parent watching their child take the first step.

Previously when I'm involved in content creation in Youtube (its not chua333 I promsied, the channel's name is completely different from my nickname), I always told myself will I be visiting my videos in the future and feel proud about it before I published the videos. If the creator itself don't even love and appreciate his or her own creation, what can we expect others to do so?

Doing One Thing Well

Like I mentioned in the passage above, I used to start 10 projects (or is it 15? or 20? I can't even remember!) and finish none. In the second half of 2025 (why second half?), I learned to make one thing the best it can be before moving on.

My personal website, how I host it, how I ensure its accessibility. My blog system, how to store it, how to write them. All of them are my precious children, each one gets my full attention until it worked well, not just "good enough".

... And What Went Wrong in 2025

Impatience!!!

"Let's get into it now! What's planning? Is it edible?"

Ahh yes, the old me, always wanting to do things fast.

I always rushed through configurations, ignore documentations and rely too much on existing solutions instead of exploring myself. All of them contributed to one thing, when I went back and visited them again, I have no idea where to start off with. Do I run this "hihi532.py" file, or do I run "donotrunfirst.py"?

I have no idea.

So! In 2026, I have decided. Slow down. Details matter. Trees that are slow to grow bear the best fruits.

Doing it right is faster than doing it twice.

Passivity

Sometimes, I feel especially lazy. And just wanted to do nothing for the entire day. But obviously it's wasting a lot of my precious time. So instead of proactively doing it myself, I tend to wait for motivation to come in instead of creating the opportunity myself.

I think, that should be changed, now.

Ma... Motivation, as you know, is like gravity. All it takes is a little push.

OK, Now For Some Technical Goals for 2026

1. Conquering into Data Tools Territory

A. PostgreSQL

When I first come into contact with SQL (MSSQL to be exact) during my 2nd Year of my degree program, I have a special feeling towards it. Its usage seems, simple, nothing too complicated, and I truly enjoyed using it, and I'm always excited whenever there's a SQL lecture or lab session coming.

Over the years, I have used MSSQL, MySQL and PostgreSQL to name a few. And its not until I finally focused on developing my personal website, and arriving at the steps of how to store my website's content I started to put effort into choosing one SQL.

Based on my own experience, the reason that I choose PostgreSQL instead of other relational database management system is... Honestly, I didn't have a strong justification. I used it the most previously due to my job + learning, so that's how I stick with it and grew to appreciate its realiability and flexibility.

But of course, my goals is to master PostgreSQL, starting from simple select statements, to join tables, and towards cte and deeper concept in PostgreSQL. The materials to learn and master them are always there, it just need someone to discover it.

B. To Power BI or To Tableau

Part of my future plan in my career is to be a data analyst, so as I'm searching for a new job, or role, or career to get into after my contract has ended, I found out that most of the job description of a "Data Analyst", "Data Scientist", or related position requires certain level of understanding on data tools, mainly SQL, Excel, and Power BI, and Tableau to some extent.

Thus, I have decided in 2026, I will be choosing one of the data visualisation tool to learn and slowly getting familiar in using it so that it acts as a stepping stone for me to dive into the data world.

2. Docker & Containers

I've used Docker before, but I'm still at the beginners level. I've compiled a list of things for me to learn in Docker, which are:
- Dockerfile and Docker Image
- Docker Compose
- Container Optimisation Techniques
- Properly Deploying Containers

Best of luck future me!

3. Infrastructure & IoT

This is where the funs begin, two paths, in which I have planned.

Infrastructure: Make everything more automated and cleaner. Less manual intervention, more scripts, better monitoring. If I'm doing something twice manually, automate it.

IoT Smart Home: Build a smart home system that integrates an LLM for controlling IoT devices. Imagine saying "turn off all lights downstairs" and having it work through natural language processing, how exciting!

4. Open Source Contributions

I've been a consumer of open source for years. It's time to give something back. Even if its a small bug reporting, or even volunteering for physical work, anything counts. As long as I can contribute and help others, its worth my time and energy. Seeing other people smiles makes me happy.

Content & Sharing Goals

~~Monthly~~ Depends-on-my-mood Blog Posts

I will be continuing my writing journey as to train my own writing skills and also sharing my journey to everyone. I could even share my travelling journeys as to inspire people chasing their own dream, much to be learn in our life. As they said life is a journey, not a destination. (or life is a marathon, not a sprint)

But I'll mainly focus in these areas (don't want to strive too far from my original cause right?):
- My experiences and what I'm learning
- Project breakdowns and how-tos
- Failures and what they taught me
- The journeys to the destinations

I have no pressure to be "viral", just like how I did it for my Youtube channel, without pressure, just an authentic representations of parts of my journeys.

Beyond Code: Personal Goals

Fitness

Gaming

Reaching Diamond rank in League of Legends. Yes, it's "just a game," but it teaches:
- Strategic and tactical thinking
- Handling pressure
- Learning from mistakes
- Consistent improvement

Plus, it's fun. So, why not?

Language Learning

Continuing my Japanese N3 journey. Already invested time (~~sunk-cost fallacy~~ nah its not unless giving up is the better choice), no quitting now. Language learning teaches patience which is something I need to practice.

Travel

Exploring other states in my country. Experience new places, new food, new people, new perspectives. Life isn't just sitting in front of a computer and staying in my room 24/7.

The Big Theme: Critical Ignoring

Here's the skill I'm most excited to develop: critical ignoring.

I discovered this concept in a WSJ article [3] and it find it extremely useful. In a world where everyone screams for your attention such as in social media, news, trends, drama, the ability to intentionally ignore what doesn't matter is a power that helps you thrive in the bustling world.

What does Critical Ignoring means:
- Not checking social media obsessively
- Skipping the outrage (contagious things, not physically btw, but rather, online) of the day
- Ignoring trends or news that don't align with my goals
- Saying no to distractions disguised as opportunities

I'm tired of feeling like I need to know everything, read everything, react to everything for the sake of "following the trend". I don't need to, just like I don't need to learn everything, and involving myself in doing everything that seems fun.

Building Good and Breaking Bad

Two habit changes that will drive everything else:

Building: Consistency

Showing up daily, even when motivation is low. Whether it's:
- Writing code
- Exercising
- Blogging
- Learning Japanese
- Practicing League

Consistency beats intensity.

Breaking: Passivity

No more waiting for the "right moment" or the "perfect motivation", bla bla bla. Taking action creates momentum, not the other way around. Just Do It!

If I want to learn PostgreSQL -> open the docs and start reading
If I want to contribute to open source -> find an issue and start working
If I want to exercise -> put on shoes and start moving

Move! Soldier!

What Does Success Looks Like?

That's probably a question for many of us, including me.

When I'm 12, success means getting 7As in UPSR.

When I'm 15, success means getting straight As in PT3 (PMR was repalced with PT3 in 2014)

When I'm 17, success means getting straight As in SPM

When I'm 18, success means getting enrolled into a good university.

When I'm 21, success means getting into a prestigious company.

When I'm 30, success could means stable job.

When I'm 50, success could means my parents are still with me.

When I'm 80, success could means being able to stay with my partners and childrens.

Success aren't black or white, but rather a greyish area between them. Anything could mean success. From being able to walk, to earning big money. Everyone's definition of success is different, so why should we care so much about other's perspectives or worried about how our future will be, where we can live the best of our life in the current world? After all, "Yesterday is history, tomorrow is a mystery, today is a gift, which is why we call it the present".

So by the end of 2026, I will be asking myself a question, what did you do in 2026 that makes you proud? And hopefully I will be proudly looking back at the things I done in the year.

Instead of asking "Did I achieve every single goal?", why not ask "Did i grow, stayed consistent and focus on what matters most?"

If I'm:
- Smarter than yesterday's me
- More consistent in my habits
- Better at ignoring noises
- Contributing to the community
- Healthier and more balanced

Then I can say my 2026 was a success. Be proud with it.

Final Thoughts

There's a poem I found previously where I really like. I found it during a time where I'm in one of the hardest moment in my life (at least that's what I feel back then). And this poem accompanied me throughout that journey.

New York is 3 hours ahead of California,
but it does not make California slow.
Someone graduated at the age of 22,
but waited 5 years before securing a good job!
Someone became a CEO at 25,
and died at 50.
While another became a CEO at 50,
and lived to 90 years.
Someone is still single,
while someone else got married.
Obama retires at 55,
but Trump starts at 70.
Absolutely everyone in this world works based on their Time Zone.
People around you might seems to go ahead of you,
some might seem to be behind you.
But everyone is running their own RACE, in their own TIME.
Don't envy them or mock them.
They are in their TIME ZONE, and you are in yours!
Life is about waiting for the right moment to act.
So, RELAX.
You're not LATE
You're not EARLY
You are very much ON TIME, and in your TIME ZONE Destiny set up for you

According to Lai et al. (2023) [4] and Anderson et al. (2024) [5], about the rise in anxiety for younger generations. Due to multiple factors such as the usage of social media and internet makes comparison relatively easier among young adults, which leads to poor mental health and life dissatisfaction and may trigger social anxiety in individuals.

I was part of the "statistics" of anxious young adults during that time and I was suffering from anxiety due to social factors and pressure from studies. But gradually as I change my lifestyle and improving my mental health, I have finally put my past self away. Maybe I can talk more about this one day in my future blogs.

To formally end the blog on 2026 Resolution, I just want to say I'm not trying to become someone else, I just want to become a better version of myself. As long as I'm still:

References Materials

  1. Velasquez, F. (2026, March 25). Nvidia CEO Jensen Huang claims AGI has been “achieved,” can create billion-dollar businesses. Yahoo Finance. https://finance.yahoo.com/news/nvidia-ceo-jensen-huang-claims-agi-has-been-achieved-can-create-billion-dollar-businesses-172225126.html

  2. Jones, J., & Law, N. (2026, March 21). The entry-level job market is the worst it’s been in 37 years. Stop blaming Gen Z | Fortune. Fortune. https://fortune.com/2026/03/21/entry-level-jobs-gen-z-not-their-fault/

  3. Mims, C. (2026, January 2). Your Key Survival Skill for 2026: Critical Ignoring. WSJ. https://www.wsj.com/tech/personal-tech/critical-ignoring-social-media-7e236f52

  4. Lai, F., Wang, L., Zhang, J., Shan, S., Chen, J., & Tian, L. (2023). Relationship between Social Media Use and Social Anxiety in College Students: Mediation Effect of Communication Capacity. International Journal of Environmental Research and Public Health, 20(4), 3657. https://doi.org/10.3390/ijerph20043657

  5. Anderson, T. L., Valiauga, R., Tallo, C., Hong, C. B., Manoranjithan, S., Domingo, C., Paudel, M., Untaroiu, A., Barr, S., & Goldhaber, K. (2024). Contributing factors to the rise in adolescent anxiety and associated mental health Disorders: A narrative review of current literature. Journal of Child and Adolescent Psychiatric Nursing, 38(1), e70009. https://doi.org/10.1111/jcap.70009

Any goals for your 2026? Working on "critical ignoring" too? I'd love to hear your thoughts, feel free to reach out at [email protected] or connect with me on LinkedIn as you prefer.