Instead of setting just a New Year’s resolution, try this.
If you already set your New Year’s resolution you are like 45% of people. 38% of people said they never make resolutions. Unfortunately, 73% of people that set resolutions for the new year fail by the second week of February. 8%, from the statistics I found, achieve their set resolution.
According to Google, the most popular new year’s resolution is to get healthy. If that happens to be yours, I found a list of 50 healthy resolutions you can set that aren’t about losing weight and are instead about lots of ways to be healthier in the coming year. To reach any of them you will need a solid plan of action and I found just the hack for you.
Break down your resolution into weekly goals that can be measured.
Try this. After you have decided on your big goal, work backwards and break it down into weekly, smaller goals, that you know you can obtain. Here’s an example.
Let’s say I want to lose 10 pounds. I think I can lose 1 pound in the next week. To obtain that, my grocery list will be comprised of mostly veggies, lean meat, and lots of green tea and water. All doable. At the end of the week if I haven’t lost the 1 pound I can adjust my diet accordingly. Maybe I need to add some exercise to burn some extra calories. Whatever it takes, you need to see if that smaller, weekly goal is obtainable and make adjustments each week to obtain it or exceed it.
Get 10% smarter
If you have set a resolution in 2018 to learn more about the things that can impact your paycheck and satisfaction level at work, you might have decided you want to read more. Breaking that down into small chunks may look like the first week you decide what you would want to learn more about. Have a conversation with the people that your learning would impact the most to find out what they think you need to learn more about. Your boss or clients may have suggestions for you.
The second week could be choosing which books, magazines, or podcasts you want to read or listen to and decide how you can consume them in the shortest period of time. You might decide that listening to audiobooks on the way to work or while you are getting ready in the morning works best for you. It’s possible, that reading is something you enjoy better than listening to content, so, in that second week you make sure to carve out reading time each week moving forward. Break into small chunks how much you can read or listen to a week.
Writing down your goals and aspirations is powerful. You could get lucky and be amazingly healthy after 50 or land your dream job or become the type of person you are proud of being. For most of us, though, reaching deeply satisfying accomplishments takes planning, discipline, and hard work.
If you want to get organized
If your resolution has to do with being organized, try setting a goal this week of working on one aspect of what you want to tidy up. Let’s say you are having a problem finding things in your computer. You spend too much time searching for things when, if it was organized you could complete your task list more quickly. (This is assuming, of course, that you create a task list each week and better yet, schedule time for each one on your calendar.)
Your weekly goal, for the first week, could be to watch 2 YouTube videos on how to best organize what it is that you want to organize. Don’t even do it yet, just watch the videos and get ideas on how best to approach it. At the end of the week, celebrate an accomplishment. Week 2 you could decide to execute a small part of your getting organized plan by setting a 10-minute alarm on your phone. Just devote 10 minutes to doing it this week.
Chip and Dan Heath made a compelling argument in their new book, The Power of Moments when they demonstrated that big successes are made up of small milestones that can be measured and celebrated along the way.
Trust me, just by reading this far, your chances have dramatically improved for reaching your goals this year. Stay focused. You are usually the biggest obstacle to obtaining your highest level desired outcomes and that’s something you have complete control over.
I promise you that this hack works. I haven’t had a drink in many, many years now and I have done it one day at a time.
Happy New Year to you! I am blessed to have you in my life and for you to allow me to walk with you on this journey. The growth I get to witness each day is truly inspiring. Thank you for that!
