Happy New Year!
No one starts a new year with plans to make it worse than the year before. New Year’s resolutions are a great conversation topic, but did you know that only 45% of people actually make a resolution? Since only 8% of those who make resolutions actually keep them, why should you even bother? Because people who make resolutions are 10 times more likely to attain their goals than people who don’t make resolutions. After all, resolutions really are just goals.
So, how do you actually keep a resolution? 75% of people who make a resolution keep it for the first week, so what happens after that point?
Here are my recommendations for how to keep it up!
- Write your goals down. Just making goals is a good start, but writing them down helps to keep you accountable, reminds you of what the goals are and why you want to accomplish them in the first place. People who write their goals down are 42% more successful in achieving the goals.
- Make sure that the goals are specific. Don’t just say “I want to lose weight” or “I want to exercise more.” Instead, say “I want to lose 10 pounds” or “I want to exercise 5 hours a week.”
- The goals must be attainable. A weight loss goal of 10 pounds a week is unreasonable and unhealthy, a goal to exercise every single day will make you feel like a failure if you miss just one.
- Put a time line on the goal. This will help you to monitor your progress and make sure you stay on track. If you plan to lose 10 pounds, but don’t give yourself a deadline, it’s easier to procrastinate and then fall off the wagon all together. Also, if you know that you want to lose 10 pounds by the end of the year, you need to lose 2 pounds a month and it’s easy to make a plan to get this done. Breaking the goal into steps lets you celebrate small successes along the way, giving you positive reinforcement.
- Find an accountability partner. It helps you stay on track when you know you have to report to someone else about your progress. It also gives you support in both times of success and times of set back. A study from Dominican University found that people who give regular progress reports to their accountability partners are 78% more likely to be successful in their resolutions.
- Plan for maintenance. What happens when you reach your goal? Make sure you have a plan to make new goals to help maintain your goal. If you just see reaching a goal as the end, you’re more likely to revert to your old ways and lose your progress. This happens often to people who have reached their weight loss goals and then gain it back because they didn’t plan a way to maintain it.
So make a resolution and keep it! You’ll thank yourself for making a positive change in your life. I’m going to use all of you as my accountability partners… One of my resolutions for this year is to exercise at least 3 hours a week. I’ll be updating my progress on Facebook and I would love for all of you to join me there with stories of your progress too!
Jennifer Tighe de Soto, MD is a cosmetic surgeon who is board certified through the American Academy of Aesthetic Medicine. For more advice from Dr. de Soto on SmartLipo and other aesthetic treatments please visit www.omahaliposuction.com where you can read her blog and see before and after photos of actual patients. If there’s a topic you would like to see us cover in a blog, please Contact Us.
References:
https://www.statisticbrain.com/new-years-resolution-statistics/
