How to make a New Year’s resolution you can keep

Ah the good old resolution. We make them every year, each time more determined to succeed, and each time we break these promises to ourselves within weeks of making them. Think back… have you really ever made a resolution that you stuck to all year?

Didn’t think so.

So just what is it that we’re doing so wrong? It must be possible to pledge to do something and stick to it, but why do we always end up falling short?

I think there are two reasons why we never see through our resolutions. The first is that we’re much to ambitious about what we can achieve, and the second is that, for the most part resolutions focus on something negative – giving up things we like, or taking up things we don’t like because we think we should.

Being realistic

While being optimistic and ambitious with your resolutions is great on the one hand, on the other if you’re not realistic about what you can achieve you will inevitably end up being disappointed. There’s no harm in having modest goals that you know you can achieve, so stick to simple promises that you’re determined to see through.

Being positive

Try to avoid building your resolutions around negative factors – if you want to lose weight for instance, instead of deciding to not eat crisps, you could make your goal to fit into a certain size dress for a special occasion. It’s a much more positive way to look at achieving something which will spur you on.

How to make your resolutions

If you’re really serious about your resolutions, then take a bit of time over them. Chances are there are quite a few things you’d like to promise yourself, but you can’t do everything so you’ll need to decide which are the most important.

Write down some of your ideas, then take each one in turn and think about how realistic it would be to try and achieve it. Is it too long term? Could you split it into a few parts and take it a bit at a time? Getting your friends and family involved is often a great way to help you decide which of all the things you’ve talked about you really want to achieve.

Narrow your choices down to just one or two resolutions and think about how you’ll go about meeting your goals in a way you think you can keep up, and more importantly in a way that you’ll enjoy.

How to keep your resolutions

So you’ve made your promises to yourself, but that’s the easy bit. Now you have to stick to them. Get your goals written down and put them up somewhere – stick them to a notice board or on the fridge – somewhere you’ll see them every day.

Split the goals into smaller targets so your resolution seems more manageable and so that you can review your progress every month or so. Commit to keeping a check on how your resolution is going, and don’t feel that you can’t change some of your final goals. If you find that it’s not a realistic target cut it back a bit – because at the end of the year when you’ve made it you’ll feel so much happier with yourself.

What resolutions are you going to make and how do you plan to stick to them?

{Image: Guerrilla Futures | Jason Tester}