Ever year I think about making New Year’s resolutions. This year I have not made any as of yet. I want them to be successful this year and not something I quit 3 months into. Below are the ways in which to make your New Year’s resolutions successful.
- It is helpful to get others involved in your New Year’s resolution. Either have the same resolution as someone else, or tell someone about your goal and ask the person to help you stick to it. Peer pressure works. Based on previous studies, it’s also helpful to put money on the line. Give money to a trusted friend with an arrangement that you’ll get it back at the end of the year only if you fulfill your resolution.
- Trying to adopt a new habit or introducing something new to their life has a higher rate of success. Resolutions about avoiding or quitting something were less successful. “For example, if your goal is to stop eating sweets in order to lose weight, you will most likely be more successful if you say ‘I will eat fruit several times a day’ instead. You then replace sweets with something healthier, which probably means you will lose weight and also keep your resolution,” stated Per Carlbring, a psychology professor at Stockholm University. “You cannot erase a behavior, but you can replace it with something else. Although this might be harder to apply to the resolution ‘I will quit smoking,’ which is something you might do 20 times a day,” Carlbring added. It might be possible to quit smoking by replacing it with bubble gum candy cigarettes. You still take the smoke break. You would then have bubble gum/candy instead of a smoke.
- Make sure your goal is achievable. Break down a large goal into obtainable segments throughout the year. This way you will not feel defeated after 3 months.
My goal this year might be weight loss. As always, I pack on the pounds for the Holidays and now need to work at losing the weight for the rest of the year. Hopefully, some of you may have more interesting goals for 2021. If you do, please share in the comments below.
