New Year’s Eve is often highly anticipated and then a massive anti-climax. Bars and restaurants are suddenly triple the price, the best laid plans often go awry and New Year’s Day is not only accompanied by a hangover, but also by a big list of things you decided just the day before would be your primary life focus.
New Year resolutions are part and parcel of seeing in another year; reflecting on the twelve months’ past and wondering if we’re where we wanted to be. With the dominance of social media, we now also have shiny glittering photos of all our family and friends’ lives that always look more successful, more fulfilling and generally better than ours. This, of course, is because we only post our highlights on Facebook, the majority of people on your friends list don’t have a backstage pass to the less enjoyable moments! But ignoring the social side, the end of a year is when we decide how we will improve our lives in the year to come. January the 1st seems to have a feel of a fresh slate, a new beginning that we don’t associate with any other time in the calendar.
So what’s on your New Year’s Resolution list? The most common are to quit smoking, lose weight and improve/change employment. These are three rather massive life changes; you go to work nearly every day, your weight is directly linked (in the most part) to your daily diet and exercise regime, and if you’re a smoker, you smoke every day. To change such ingrained habits are not easy and, depressingly, one survey quotes only 8% of individuals achieving these goals.
Let’s face it – big changes are hard work and a little scary, so you need to deal with them carefully if you’re going to make a success of them.
Find your End Goal & Make Suitable Landmarks
If you want to lose two stone that’s great, but why not start off with the aim to lose 5lbs in a month? By showing yourself you can do it in smaller steps, those little chunks will soon add up, and you’ll look back and realise how far you’ve come.
Make your Goals More Specific
“Exercise more” is a very wide aim, but if, for example, you specify that you’d like to exercise for 30 minutes extra a week, you’ll give yourself more direction.
Be Realistic
Do you enjoy running? If not, you probably won’t succeed at it and then you’ll feel you’ve failed. Find something you really enjoy doing; why not check out a local netball team or inline skating club, for example? By thinking about what you’d have fun doing and starting from there, in a few months you may find you’re exercising more without having to force yourself to do so, and suddenly you’ve found yourself a new hobby!
Give Yourself a Break
Big changes take time and you might find that one year isn’t long enough to achieve your goal. But the important thing is you’re committing to improve things for yourself. So if you’re not quite there with last year’s resolutions you’re not a failure, you just haven’t finished working on it. By alleviating the pressure you’ll have a much bigger chance of success.
And finally …
Why not use the beginning of 2015 to look back on last year and celebrate all the positive things in your life.
Realise your successes, however small;
“This year I finished reading that book.”
“I finally sorted out the shed.”
Concentrate on the positives, celebrate small steps of success, and you’ll be amazed what a boost it’ll give you. It’s not easy to stick to your resolutions and it can be difficult to persevere when it feels like a losing battle. But you’re not at war – just because things don’t change instantly it doesn’t mean you’re not going to see the changes you want to. So, by all means make a list but don’t set it in stone, or curse yourself for any slip ups. If you really want it, you will get there and, in the meantime, have a very, very happy New Year!