How to Set Achievable Resolutions

Why do we set resolutions for ourselves only to fail to achieve them? We tell ourselves year after year that we’ll eat more healthily, we’ll get up earlier, we’ll stop shouting at the kids, we’ll get to the gym and build some muscle. How long does it last?

Setting ourselves goals.

It’s important we set ourselves achievable goals. They motivate us into doing better, into improving ourselves and our lives. They help us feel good when we do achieve them. We like to strive for bigger and better things because we feel we’re succeeding, and we can feel good about ourselves. Telling ourselves we’ll make a change without truly committing to it is simply setting ourselves up for failure and disappointment.

If you made a resolution this year, it’s because you’re not happy about something. Whatever it may be, you know it’s something to be improved on, whether that be for your own self-confidence, your financial independence, your health, or your sanity, you know you want change. Whatever the change may be, it all comes back to one thing – happiness. Every time we consider doing something for ourselves it’s to improve our own happiness. Think about it. Why do we bother doing anything? Underneath it all is a desire to feel happy in ourselves and about ourselves. So, why on earth do we allow ourselves to fail?

The problem with happiness.

The problem with happiness is that it can be found in immediacy. When we’re eating healthily but that cake crops up, we reap the immediate benefits of happiness by eating the cake but then feel miserable that we didn’t stick to the diet. The happiness is fleeting but it’s hard to turn it down when it’s presented to you and you’ve still such a long way to go to losing those pounds and feeling that deeper sense of happiness in yourself.

When we’re determined to get to the gym but feeling a little on the tired side and decide that we’d be happier sitting on the sofa with a brew, we’re exchanging the more fulfilling sense of accomplishment and satisfaction deriving from a little effort with an immediate sense of mild satisfaction that will soon be replaced with disappointment and annoyance at ourselves for not giving ourselves a kick up the bum.

So what can we do about it?

Change for the better comes with a myriad of benefits. Imagine how great you’ll feel at the end of the year to say you managed to succeed, to stick to your resolution for an entire 365 days. How will it impact your life? How will it impact you emotionally? How might it affect those around you positively? These are all important to think about when you commit to your resolution. These things will help you succeed, they will help motivate you. If we’re going to reject the immediacy of a low-level satisfaction with the longer-term, deeper-level happiness and sense of achievement, we have to plan ahead and strategize. How will you make sure you don’t succumb to the allure of immediate satisfaction, that ‘last’ cigarette, or that Sunday lie in that lasts all week?

You need to ask yourself what lengths you’re prepared to go to in order to feel that deeper sense of satisfaction, success, achievement, accomplishment, freedom, confidence, inner calm, and happiness. How far are you willing to go? How will you overcome the immediacy? Will you simply willpower your way through it? Will you replace it with something healthier? Will you use distraction techniques until the desire dissipates? PLAN for it.

10 effective ways to achieve your resolutions:

• Write down all the reasons you made it. What needs to change and why? How are you going to achieve it? How will it feel? Get specific. Factor it into your daily life.

• Get creative. Do a mind map or a vision board or buy yourself a planner. When we can literally see our goals in front of us, it helps us maintain focus.

• Create a mantra or find a strong quote to live by. Repeat it to yourself every morning when you wake up. Start every new day with a reminder of how it will feel to succeed today and check in with yourself every night. How does it feel?

• Tell people about it. It’s much harder to give up on yourself if you know people will ask you how it’s going. Imagine that feeling!

• Find yourself a buddy that you have to report to at the end of each week. Make it someone that will offer you encouragement and support if you find yourself falling behind your targets.

• Make it realistic. You’re unlikely to make a million by the end of the year for example, or lose a stone in the next week, but how much could you realistically make each month, or how much weight could you realistically lose if you stuck to a solid plan?

• Identify your demons. What triggers you to fail. Are you self-sabotaging? Remember, what feels good in the moment will not feel good afterwards. Plan for these eventualities. 

• Find inspiration. Connect with people that have achieved what you’re aiming to do. If they can do it, you can do it. What can you learn from them?

• Don’t give up if you have a blip. A blip is temporary. Pick yourself up and start again. You haven’t failed, you simply took a step back and gathered up your energy to start afresh. Don’t let one setback ruin the rest of your year.

• Visualise coming out the other side having stayed strong and how amazing you will feel about yourself. What would this look like? Spending a little time each day focusing on the end goal keeps the motivation alive and spurs us on toward success.

Imagine this time next year. Setting a new resolution, knowing you achieved this year’s. Knowing it’s possible to create the change you want in your life. Feeling confident that you can be a better version of yourself, step by step, day by day, year by year.

Here’s to a new you and a happier new year!