7 Resolution Hacks for the New Year!

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All of us want to live better lives, and resolutions can be handy tools to help us change. But how do we keep these promises to ourselves? It can be so easy to slack off.

These 7 hacks can help you keep your New Year’s resolution!

Hack 1: Choose ONE Resolution

Deep down, we all want to be exceptional. We know we should read more, spend more time with family, work out more, etc., etc., etc. That’s why, come New Year, we make a ton of promises to do all of those things.

. . . and we fail. We overwhelm ourselves and then give up.

So, don’t do that! Pick one key resolution. By having one goal, you can really focus on it and make it achievable. Plus, once you achieve it, you can move to your next goal!

Hack 2: Choose Your Why

Let’s say two people want to lose weight. Person A wants to fit into their older clothes. Person B wants to be healthy for their family’s sake.

Person B is more likely to succeed because they have a Prevention Goal, which is a goal that employs a real responsibility as motivation.

Person A will struggle because they have a Promotion Goal. While positive, this goal doesn’t have a real responsibility attached. If they drop this resolution, it doesn’t affect anyone but them. Person resolution has a lot more “oomph” behind it.

So, what does that mean for you? That you need to choose your “why” and take it seriously. Taking a little time to find an honest and important motivation is absolutely worth it.

Hack 3: Addressing Your Why Not’s

Hard truth time – the reason we fail our goals is, well, ourselves. While we can blame outside forces (with some degree of truth), in the end, we’re our own worst enemy.

Why does this happen? In part, because we’ve all built up bad habits and ways of thinking. These negative mental and physical behaviors keep us from achieving our goals.

And you know what? That’s normal. That’s the way it’s always been for everyone ever. Our good half wants to be better, and our bad half wants things to be easy.

So, part of what you need to do is identify your negative ways of thinking that keep you trapped. Once you identify these thoughts and habits, you need to intentionally confront them.

For example, a bad mental habit I have is creating bad justifications or refusing to acknowledge lazy choices. I’m not going to the gym because I’m tired or I just don’t think about the popsicle I’m grabbing from the freezer.

So, my plan is when I try to come up with an excuse or to not think about something, I’m going to vocally “confront” those ideas. When I want to go home instead of working out, I’ll say why I don’t want to go, tell myself why that’s silly, and then make the right choice.

Hack 4: Break Your Resolution Up

Woof – that was a lot of self-reflection. Let’s switch gears to something a bit more practical. It’s important to break your New Year’s resolution up into achievable, reasonable goals.

Let’s say you want to lose 20 pounds. That’s intimidating. Now, let’s say you want to lose 20 pounds in 4 months. Well, that’s a lot better, isn’t it? That’s just 5 pounds per month or a little over 1 pound a week.

By breaking up you goal, it feels achievable, you both get a handy timeline and regular wins that will help transform the resolution into a habit.

Hack 5: Be Flexible (To an Extent) on Methods

So, now we have a clear goal, good motivations, and we’ve broken down our goal into a solid timeframe. That’s awesome! But how do you achieve your goal? Well, that’s on you to find out. You’ll need to do some research to build a proper plan.

But after you build your plan, remember that it isn’t set in stone. If you find that something is unachievable or isn’t working like you thought it would, take some time and adjust your methods.

All that said, if you find yourself changing your plan over and over (and it gets easier each time), knock it off! Change will never be easy – it takes hard work that you can’t avoid.

Hack 6: Track Your Progress

It’s tempting to have vague goals, because vague goals don’t hold us accountable. If you’re just trying to “be healthier,” that salad you had for lunch is a win! If you’re trying to actually lose weight, it’s just a step in the right direction.

So, you need to make your New Year’s resolution measurable and then track your achievements. Count up your workouts and time, watch and record what you eat, etc. It’s not fun, but it can be a powerful way to push yourselves toward results

Hack 7: Share and Support

Sometimes, self-improvement can feel embarrassing. We feel like we should already be where we want to be, and so we clam up and try to keep our resolutions secret or downplay them.

But sharing your (well-thought out) resolution with friends and family can be beneficial. And don’t stop at sharing it once. Talk to them about your struggles and successes – you can even ask someone to be an accountability partner on your self-improvement journey.

So, get a workout partner, join a book club, share your story, etc. These people will help support you and encourage you to keep working at it!

I really hope that these 7 New Year’s resolution hacks will help you on your journey. Good luck and I believe in you! You can do it!

Thanks to Cigna, John Rampton of Entrepreneur, Ashley Welch of CBS News, Margartia Tartakovsk, M.S., of PsychCentral, Craig Harper of Lifehack, Steli Efti of Close, and the American Psychological Association for the valuable information.

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