The beginning of a new year is a popular time to reflect and re-energize one’s ambition to adopt better behaviors. Despite these excellent intentions, 80 percent of all New Year’s resolutions fail, with the majority of people losing enthusiasm by the middle of February. Changing your behaviors is difficult, but there are a few things you can do to help yourself succeed. Here are some pointers to help you make and keep resolutions.
Make a reasonable aim for yourself.
Many people set goals that aren’t achievable in the first place, which is one reason why so many New Year’s resolutions fail. At the beginning of the year when your motivation has peaked, it’s easy to establish a huge, ambitious objective. While it’s good to push yourself, you should also consider whether your goal is achievable. Any objective that necessitates significant changes in many parts of normal behaviour is likely to be impossible to achieve. If you want to start running, for example, it’s better to set a goal of running two days a week rather than trying to run a marathon right away.
Develop a strategic plan.
Because habit changes don’t happen overnight, it’s critical to have a strategy in place to ensure you’re making continuous progress. Break down your resolution into smaller tasks or milestones by taking a few minutes. Make a realistic schedule for when you hope to achieve each goal. Then think about what tiny efforts you’ll take each week to get closer to achieving these short-term objectives. Include prizes along the way to encourage your new habit and celebrate your accomplishments.
Keep track of your progress.
Take some time each day or week to track your progress once you’ve started working toward your goal. This regular reflection can assist you in fine-tuning your strategy and holding yourself accountable. It’s also important to keep track of your progress in order to stay motivated towards keep your new year’s resolution from failing. Seeing a run of success can provide the extra motivation you need to keep working hard even on bad days.
Motivate yourself again.
It’s simple to become motivated when you first begin working toward your objective. You
haven’t experienced any difficulty as a result of your attempts to alter your habits up to this time. However, the difficulty and discomfort of adjustment can make it more difficult to stick to your resolution as time goes on.
Ask for assistance.
Change is difficult, but it doesn’t have to be done alone. Another crucial strategy for achieving your resolution is joining a support group. If your New Year’s resolve is to lose weight or exercise, you’ll be in good company, since many others make similar resolutions. It shouldn’t be difficult to discover a group of like-minded people who are working toward the same objective as you, whether online or in person.
Setbacks should not discourage you.
Even the best-laid plans cannot guarantee that life will not get in the way of your goal. There will surely be a point when you make a mistake. The trick is to not let that blunder lead to you giving up. On good days and especially on terrible days, always be gentle to yourself. It’s simple to start berating ourselves because we’re generally our own harshest judges. These negative thoughts might make a minor blunder feel like a failure when it’s really only a stumbling block.