New Year New You – How to Keep Your New Year’s Resolutions

 

It’s almost the New Year; the time to reflect on your aspirations and set goals to improve your health and happiness. Sounds great, right? But how many of us actually keep our New Year’s resolutions past January? The truth is, not many.

 If you really want to reach your goals this year it is important to set realistic goals and plan ahead. Here are ways to help you keep your new year’s resolutions and achieve your goals.

Get Specific – Rather than saying, “I want to save money” or “I want to lose weight”; determine how much you want to save and how much weight you want to lose, focus more on being healthier and come up with a tangible plan to achieve your goal. Also imagine what reaching your goal will do for you and what you can achieve and gain once you’ve reached it.

Write it Down – Write down your goals and detail a game plan to get there. You can use a planner or a calendar. You can type it out on your laptop or write it down on a piece of paper. Just make sure it’s written and in a place where you can see it and refer to it often. When you see it, you can achieve it; it’s better to plan ahead

Make Time - Set aside time for your goals. Detail your weekly schedule so you aren’t side tracked by distractions.

Get a Partner – Get a little help from your friends. Having a group, partner, or friend with a similar resolution helps to keep you both encouraged are more likely to reach your goals. It can be a bonding experience you’ll never forget.

From Big Goals to Baby Steps - Break big goals down into smaller increments. For example, if your goal is to lose weight, set monthly weight goals, if you goal is to write a book, promise to write a few pages a day.

Identify Time-Wasters - A lot of great tasks in life don’t get finished, because we waste a lot of time doing things that are unimportant or unrelated to our goals. Think about all the time you spend doing things that take you away from your goals, like social networking or watching TV; we so readily say, “Oh, I just don’t have time.” The truth is that you can make time. Identify the time-wasters in your day and replace them with projects and tasks that will bring you closer to your goal.

Think about Last Year - Reflecting on the mistakes and mishaps of last year is a good place to start when making New Year’s resolutions. Where could you have done better? What do you want to see change? No need to be down on yourself. Just take a look at your weak points and see what you can do about them this year.

Remember life is about change, so focus on making better changes for yourself. I personally don’t set resolutions because I feel like I am forcing myself to do something that I may or may not be prepared to do and I don’t want the new year to be the reason I do it. So my changes come when I am ready to make them. Some of you know I am attempting to make the transition into Vegetarianism after the beginning of the year I chose that time because I didn’t want the temptation of the holiday foods and meals to ruin my efforts.

And…It Is What It Is!