The year of 2016 is finally coming to a close (thank goodness), and a year of new opportunities is just around the bend (we hope). As with any new year, people make resolutions of things they'd like to improve upon or start incorporating into their lives that were lacking in the previous year. Ranging from big commitments, such as going to the gym every day during the new year, to smaller ones, like cutting down on the intake of sweets throughout a given week, resolutions take form in many different ways, and sometimes they can be difficult to follow through with, so what can be done to make accomplishing these goals easier? Here are three tips to help you achieve your goals as we ring in 2017.
1. Start Small And Ease Into It
A common thought is that when you plan a new years resolution, it must manifest itself in every day of the new year. For example, someone who doesn't go to the gym as often as he or she would like might be hit with a sudden wind of inspiration to exercise more often, thus devising a plan of hitting the gym every day as their New Year's resolution. However, once the new year becomes reality, one can find that applying this resolution to each and every day can prove to be quite challenging and maybe even impossible. After awhile, said person may begin to lose hope about becoming healthier and abandon the resolution all together. Instead, I suggest that you ease into your resolution if it's rather intimidating. If you're relatively new to incorporating exercise into your daily routine, don't rush to make it happen all at once. As with everything, it will take time and perseverance. Instead of making it an every day task, start off with trying to make it to the gym twice a week for the first month or two. From there, gradually increase your trips with each month or whenever you feel ready. It will be easier for you to reach your overall goal if you ease into it and accept that it is going to take determination for it to happen.
2. Spread Out Your Resolutions
If you're like me, then you probably have more than one resolution for the new year. They are the forgotten goals of yesteryear or the ones that burned out after it became to overwhelming to keep the spirit of determination alive. Often times with multiple new years resolutions, if they are blunt "stop swearing" or "stop using social media so much" goals, it might become frustrating to stop or start all of these different activities all at once as you adjust to the withdrawal or the new addition. It might be counteractive in that it could be exhausting to keep up with the different tasks and they instead could morph into chores instead of resolutions, quite possibly leading you to abandon them all together. A different approach to having multiple resolutions is distributing them among the different months so that you can focus on one thing each month. However you want to pursue each goal is up to you, but be sure to ease into each resolution so you stay excited about the outcome. Remember that these resolutions are supposed to make you a better person, not a more miserable one. Spreading them out will help you stay motivated and more likely to accomplish each one.
3. Lose Track? Set Up A New Start Date
Resolutions can be hard to stick with all year long, and too frequently they're abandoned because they become tedious and annoying. Other times life just becomes too busy and it's hard to make time for our new goals, so we forget about them. When this happens, we say, "Oh well, maybe next year I'll try again." There may be scenarios where this is a suitable conclusion, but I encourage you to instead take another shot at your goal. Take a short break of a few weeks and mark a day on your calendar where you get back in the swing of things. Once again, you should ease back into it, especially if you've punted the whole plan once already. Life is messy, and we're bound to get off track at some point, but that doesn't mean we can't try again. Dust yourself off, and get back on the saddle.
Hopefully you can use these three tips to accomplish your goals for 2017 and every new year from that point on. Happy New Year and best of luck to you!
