The beginning of the year is a natural reset point. Markets quieten, work slows, and you’ve got the mental bandwidth to reflect on the year. Investors often overestimate the importance of what happens in markets and underestimate the change that happens in their own lives.

The point of a portfolio is to serve you and make your life better. As you reset for 2026, three questions will help to anchor your thinking. These questions will push you towards a more focused portfolio and realign it to account for the changes to your life, goals and portfolio in 2025.

My approach is to review my portfolio comprehensively once a year at the end of financial year. I do a second review every calendar year that takes into account whether my goals and/or circumstances have changed. If so, a more comprehensive investment strategy review is warranted. If not, just a quick review to check my portfolio is still aligned to my goals.

Are your goals still aligned to what you want from life?

What we want changes as we change. Goals aren’t static. Most investors set goals at a moment in time and those goals don’t get revised when life changes. Careers evolve, relationships change, and personal priorities shift with life changes – kids, aging parents, family dynamics, etc. Your goals need to serve who you are.

It is difficult when you’re setting long-term goals to accurately visualise whether this goal is going to serve you in 20, 30 or 40 years. The plan that you created when you started investing will more than likely change.

It may be that you have started a family earlier than expected and want to prioritise homeownership. You may realise that you want more flexibility than structured work offers – you want to work fewer hours, start a business or take longer breaks during the year.

The first step for a reset is looking at each major goal that you have and asking yourself whether it is still meaningful for you. The purpose of financial goals is to outline what you want out of life so you can best manage the resources and capacity at your disposal. If a goal is no longer serving you there may be an opportunity to reallocate your resources in a better way.

If your answer to whether your goal is still meaningful to you is ‘yes’, proceed. If the answer is no, you may need to recalibrate your plan.

A common trap for investors is confusing a goal with a vague benchmark. You may go into the new year thinking that you want ‘a higher return’ or ‘I want my superannuation balance to be bigger’. These are outcomes and not goals. A goal has a purpose.

If you want ‘a higher return’ or a ‘bigger balance’, why do you need your portfolio to grow? What will that money enable you to do?

If you can’t articulate your goal with specifics, you may be pursuing something because you believe it is what will make you happy or make your life better. More money is always good and opens up more options, but you need to ensure that it is achievable and tied to a non-financial goal or you will likely sabotage yourself.

Resetting your goals ensures that your portfolio objectives remain aligned with your values and who you are. Most of the time, these shifts will be minor – but it’s good to check in and ensure you are still on the right path.

Does your financial plan still reflect any changes to your circumstances?

Life changes quietly most of the time. For many of us, life changes don’t immediately prompt an update to our financial goals and investment strategy. Small or large shifts in your circumstances can happen throughout the year and may slip through the cracks without a dedicated effort at reflection.

The past year could have included a higher salary, a new job, a change in location, an addition to the family, mortgage obligations or changes or new expenses. Your goals may not have changed but your circumstances may mean your investment plan should be updated.

Some common changes that may impact your investment strategy are:

  • Income changes that haven’t translated into increased contributions.
  • Higher expenses that have not been factored into your cash flow or your emergency fund.
  • Lifestyle decisions such as planning for children, taking time off work where your superannuation contributions have stopped, or buying a home. These changes likely require different savings levels or investment approaches.
  • Time horizon adjustments such as you deciding you can work more until retirement or want to quit early.

Ensure that your investment strategy reflects the season of life that you are in.

Where did you deviate from your plan?

Every year is another opportunity for you to drift from your investment strategy and plan. Sometimes it is intentional, but other times it is impulsive.

A deviation is an opportunity to learn about your behaviour and how you react to new situations. Reflection is a valuable form of self-assessment for investors which can prevent poor behaviour in the future.

A personal example from the past year is my reaction to the market dip in April after Trump’s tariff announcement. I do not hold cash for tactical allocations and my investment strategy is solely based on maintaining my strategic asset allocation. In other words, I don’t place money aside to take opportunity of changing market conditions. I rely on investing in regular, disciplined intervals to build long term wealth. In April, I saw the market drop and didn’t want to miss lower valuation levels. I withdrew funds from my emergency fund to take advantage of this.

There are several problems with my actions. The first is that my emergency fund was not fully stocked until I replenished it over the next couple of months. If there was an emergency, I would be in a sticky spot. If I lost my job, I’d have less runway to find another and be stressed about how to meet my mortgage payments and bills.

The second problem was my future investment contributions were being rerouted into my emergency fund for the next few months which diverted from my routine. It wasn’t one mistake – it was three months of continuing to divert from my plan. This defeats the purpose of one of the core tenets of my plan which is to be disciplined and automate as much of my process as possible to avoid the impact of behavioural risk.

If the market kept dropping over the next few months I could have taken advantages of even lower prices than April. This might have tempted me to remove even more from my emergency fund which would have put at further risk from a set-back.

The key to reflecting on my actions is not the outcome. The steep drop in April was followed by a rebound. I could easily pat myself on the back and say I did the right thing. However, my strategy has been set with not only my goals in mind but also my personality. If I thought I could time the market successfully I would pick a different strategy. It is the process that counts and not an individual outcome that counts over the long-term.

I find this reflection helpful as it reinforces the importance of noting my behaviour and remaiingne intentional about the decisions I make going forward.

Some common deviations from your own plan may include:

  • Stopping contributions for a few months
  • Making an emotional investment decision like I did after seeing market volatility
  • Selling something too early due to fear
  • Buying something quickly without proper analysis due to excitement

Use this reflection as information to reveal where you have behavioural risks in your plan that you can make an effort to avoid in the future.

Final thoughts

No investor is perfect and we are always evolving. Get 2026 on the right foot by asking yourself the questions needed to realign your portfolio and your goals.

Going through this process will ground your decisions, refine your investment process and gain greater understanding of your own behaviour to increase your chances of success. It will reconnect your portfolio to its purpose – making progress on the pathway to your goals. Start 2026 with a strong, personalised and resilient financial plan that reflects the life you are trying to build.

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