New Year's Resolutions

Chances are, more than a couple of the top 10 most common resolutions will look familiar to you:

1. Exercise more

2. Lose weight

3. Get organized

4. Learn a new skill or hobby 

5. Live life to the fullest

6. Save more money / spend less money

7. Quit smoking

8. Spend more time with family and friends

9. Travel more

10. Read more

    
    

    Despite the best of intentions, once the glow of a fresh new year wears off, many people struggle to make good on their plans. According to a study published in the Journal of Clinical Psychology, only 46% of people who made New Year’s resolutions were successful. That means over half of the people who set a goal for the new year will fail!

    
    

    If you want to realize your New Year’s resolution this year, follow these 10 steps:

    1. Mentally prepare for change

    Changing ingrained habits is no easy task, so before diving head-first into your New Year goals, it is important to take a step back and get ready for that impending change.

    The first breakthrough in change is taking a personal inventory. Being that it’s the end of one year and the beginning of the next, it’s perfect timing to take stock of the past year’s accomplishments.

    
    

    You will want to keep upbeat with your new resolution, so you can use that positive association with last year’s accomplishments to remind you of those good feelings when you are feeling challenged.

    
    

    2. Set a goal that motivates you

    You would be surprised how often people set goals that are not for themselves. These goals could be dictated to or coerced by a manager, spouse, or parental / peer pressure.

    While it’s nice to have some external support, if you don’t share the same passion, the resolution has a small chance of succeeding and could even be dead on arrival.

    To do this, you need to make sure the goal you set is important to you and only you and that there is value or benefit for you in achieving the goal. It is these two things that will provide the reason and willingness to take action. This is also known as motivation!

    
    

    3. Limit resolutions to a manageable amount

    
    

    4. Be specific

    When it comes to setting resolutions, it’s easy to set bad goals that could lead to poor follow-through. Fortunately, the SMART goal-setting framework can help you craft better goals.

    SMART goals are:

    • Specific - Articulate the resolution as clearly as possible. For example, quitting smoking is better than being healthy. While “being healthy” is great, the wording can be interpreted in many ways.  

    • Measurable - Quantify your resolution if possible, i.e., I will lose 10% of my body weight.

    • Attainable - Choose a goal within the realm of possibility yet challenging. Making 100 friends this year would be amazing but probably pretty hard to do. On the other, making 10 new friends is doable.

    • Relevant - Keep it relevant to your priorities and goals. See the motivation section above!

    • Time-sensitive - Give yourself a time frame in which to achieve a goal. A deadline will instill some urgency and provide a time when you can celebrate your success.

      
      

      5. Break up big goals into smaller goals

      A lot of us tend to be over-eager and grandiose when it comes to resolutions. We have the best of intentions and may accidentally take on a goal that is too big to achieve. Thus, it’s helpful to divide a big goal into smaller goals that are more achievable.

      
      

      6. Write down your goals

      While it’s great to have goals, it is critical to document them in some way.

      
      

      7. Share your resolutions with others

      It’s great to make a resolution for yourself and maybe even write it down, but if no one else knows about it, it’s easy to forget about or even ignore. And when you don’t achieve it, no one will notice or care.

      
      

      8. Automate where possible

      The good news is you probably have technology in your pocket that can help you follow through on your resolution - automation in the form of reminder apps.

      
      

      9. Review your resolution regularly

      Let’s face it, if you are not thinking about your resolution regularly, you are not going to follow through. Thus, a crucial part of realizing your goal is a regular review.

      
      

      10. If you fall off track, get back on quick

      We’ve established it will take time for your resolution to become a reality, and we know change is difficult. In fact, we’ve already established we should leave some room for mistakes and setbacks.

    
    
    
    
    
    
    
    

    For more on this topic, see;

    
    

    https://www.goskills.com/Soft-Skills/Resources/Top-10-new-years-resolutions