As the year draws to a close, everyone's thoughts turn to the holidays, and then promptly after, New Year's. But with the coming of a new year, comes a tradition as old as time and as stupid as can be - New Year's Resolutions. When someone establishes a New Year's Resolution, they come up with one goal for the entire year that often involves weight loss, grades or money. More often than not, these goals are broad statements such as "this year I'm going to lose weight" or "this year I want to save more money" and when it comes down to it, these goals are almost never achieved.
When goal setting, it is a good idea to follow the 'SMART' goal setting strategy. 'SMART' is a mnemonic used to outline the qualities of a good goal and stands for: specific, measurable, attainable, relevant and time-bound. By making sure your goal follows all five of these guidelines, you are more likely to not only achieve your goal but do so in a timely and healthy manner.
People use New Year's as a landmark to start doing something, going somewhere or acting a certain way. When in all honesty, if you're making a change in your life, it shouldn't only be for the upcoming year, it should be a change you make, are happy with and stick with. If you want to lose weight, make a plan, lose the weight and keep it off. If you want to start saving money, create a budget, start using the budget and build up your savings. And if you want to be a nicer person, figure out the times you struggle to be kind, highlight some ways you can do that, and get to work. And most importantly, don't quit after a month or two, or when the year is out.
New Year's resolutions often tend to be last-minute decisions to fix some minuscule detail that a person doesn't like about themselves and end up being dropped when someone doesn't see immediate results or the results they had hoped for. So rather than setting a New Year's resolution and waiting until the first of every year to fix things we dislike, why not set constant goals to improve ourselves? Whether its your outer appearance or a part of your personality, there is always room for improvement and the best time for change is NOW, not January 1st.