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How To Make Great New Year’s Resolutions (And Actually Stick To Them)
Like most people, I often felt that the New Year was the perfect time to start afresh and switch out my bad habits for better ones. However, by mid-January or February my resolve inevitably weakened, and my goals seemed to become more and more difficult and unattainable. So last year I finally decided that I needed to go about my resolutions differently if I wanted to have any hope of accomplishing them. Here are a few of the things that I found most helpful in making, and sticking to, my New Year’s resolutions.
- Make SMART Goals.
No, I don’t necessarily mean brainy. SMART stands for specific, measurable, achievable, realistic, and time-bound. Basically what this means is that your goals should be as detailed and unambiguous as possible (as well as being something that you can actually attain in the given amount of time). For example, instead of saying that your goal is to learn a new language (which is quite vague), try saying something more along the lines of “I plan to study Spanish on Duolingo for fifteen minutes per day.” Or, if your goal is to get into better shape, try “I’m going to do half an hour of yoga on Mondays and Wednesdays.” These goals give a clear plan of action for doing a task that is measurable and relatively easy to achieve. This isn’t to say that you should avoid bigger or more…
