How To Actually Make Those New Year’s Resolutions a Reality

What's the central theme once January hits? We know this all too well: It's time to make those New Year's resolutions and figure out ways to stick to them! While making goals for the year is beneficial, they are usually huge markers that can seem unattainable at first. They can be super intimidating, which is why so many people tend to fail at their resolutions. The most popular ones are losing weight and making more money. While those can be worthwhile goals, they are often unattainable when you just throw them out there like that. So, instead of committing to huge resolutions, I’m a fan of setting smaller, more attainable goals — things that you can actually meet.

The key lies in making smaller goals along the way to the big goal. Making a plan for getting where you want to go is essential. If you have no idea how to do something, you're not going to make it. These smaller goals will lead you to the bigger one.

It is healthier to have benchmarks for your resolutions.

Success begets success. If you meet your smaller goals, you will get pumped and be more excited to go after the rest. Success makes you feel good, so setting yourself up for it is necessary to it working. If you are seeing progress, you’re more likely to keep going.

Instead of wanting to lose 40 pounds, figure out how you’re going to get there.

How much weight you want to lose per month? If you want to write a book, figure out how long you want it to be and how many words you need to write each week to get there. As you reach those milestones, celebrate them!

You don't need to wait until the huge goal is complete to feel good about yourself.

Feel good about yourself along the way and give yourself a bunch of credit. You are on the way to what you want. Once you know that you're on the right path, you're more likely to get there.

It doesn’t have to just be for a year, either.

Just because resolutions usually are expected to be finished within a single year doesn’t mean that you have to structure them that way. You could structure them out as small goals, yearly goals, and long-term goals instead.

Failing resolutions is more damaging than helpful.

Setting yourself up for success will get you a lot further, but failing the same goals year after year can leave you feeling terrible. I've had the goal of losing weight for many years now, and I'm not any closer to it than I ever was. But this year, I'm going to change things up. You could look at things this way, or with how the world is right now, maybe it’s a good year to give ourselves a break.

I’m going to change how I look at resolutions and structure them as goals.

For losing weight, I'm going to log my food daily. For writing a book, I'm going to figure out how many words I need to write to get it done. Planning it out like this is even more exciting and motivating, but I’m also going to give myself grace. I feel more optimistic heading into this new year than I have before because I feel more powerful by taking control. I'm going to crush it. And you can, too!