Sticking to New Year resolutions can be difficult. Whether you plan to stop eating sugar, run a marathon or save money, how many times have you made New Year’s resolutions and found that a couple of days, weeks or months later your good intentions are impossible to keep?
You certainly will not be alone, but rather than setting resolutions that do not make you happy or quickly start to feel unachievable, why not create a ‘wish list’ of experiences or things you would like to do.
Here is a handy guide on making New Year’s resolutions you actually want to keep and how to set achievable goals. It will be more fun!
Reflect On The Past Year
New Year’s resolutions originate from our Roman ancestors who celebrated Janus, the god of beginnings on 1 January, when people reflected on the past year and looked to the year ahead and exchanged promises, gifts and blessings.
Do as the Romans did and take a moment to reflect on the past year. Find a quiet space and jot down five things that stand out as positive experiences in your year.
Next, write down five things that you feel less positively about. These can be small moments or major life events, but looking back helps us move forwards and is a helpful way to start considering what you would like to achieve in the new year.
Small Steps
One of the reasons many people do not keep their resolutions is that they set themselves goals that are so big they often feel unattainable.
For example, rather than declaring you are going to run a marathon, when you have not run since school, why not set yourself the goal of running a 5K or 10K and build towards your goal in small steps. This is less likely to be as daunting or require such a big time commitment that you are tempted to stop.
If you still want to achieve your marathon dreams why not go for that the following year?
Keeping a diary of your progress is a useful way to help you stay on track and see how far you have come. Enlisting the support of friends and family by explaining what you are trying to achieve is another good way to help you stick to your goal.
Create Your 2019 Wish List
While in the past you may have failed to continue with resolutions that involved self-denial, going into the new year why not create a ‘wish list’ of all of the things you would like to do in 2019 instead.
Before starting, take a look at your list of highs and lows of last year and then start writing down everything you would like to do in the new year.
Do not hold back, write everything down. Your wish list can include epic things, such as travelling to Peru, climbing Mount Fuji, writing a book, to simple everyday things that make you happy. Such as going to the cinema once a month, reading the book you have always wanted to read or going for a daily walk in your lunch break.
Whatever you would like to see, do, learn or visit, write it down and then as the year progresses see how many you can tick off your list.
When you come the end of 2019, you might be surprised by how much you have achieved.
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