It’s that time of year again! A new year is beginning and with the new year comes New Year’s resolutions. We all have the best intentions to keep our New Year’s resolutions throughout the whole year although for the majority of us we do not.
Here are a few tips to increase the likelihood that you actually will maintain your New Year’s resolutions for all of 2015:
- Set goals that are realistic. Many of us have a tendency to make New Year’s resolutions that are impossible to keep up for an entire year so when making a New Year’s resolution, make sure that it is realistic!
- Be specific. Rather than saying, “I want to work out more often,” say something like, “I want to work out at least three times a week.”
- Check in with yourself on a regular basis to make sure that you are continuing to do whatever it is you said you wanted to do.
- If you find that you are not keeping up with what you said you wanted to, take the time to think about why that is. For example, why are you not working out at least three times a week? Is it because you do not have the time, you have gotten bored with the work outs that you are doing, or maybe you have lost the motivation? Whatever the reason/reasons, find a way to either modify the New Year’s resolution, for example, if you do not have time to go work out three times a week, modify it to say that you will work out two times per week. You do not have to scratch the whole resolution simply because you cannot continue with it at all. If you do not want to modify the resolution, figure out ways in which you can modify your lifestyle. For example, if the workouts are boring, find something new and exciting that you can add into your workout routine to reduce monotony. If you are lacking motivation, understand why you are lacking and motivation and work on ways to increase motivation.
- Reward yourself for maintaining your New Year’s resolutions. The best way to increase the likelihood of repeating a behavior, is to reward yourself when you do it. Then you associate the behavior with the reward, which makes it more likely you will do it again in the future. For example, after your workout, treat yourself to a smoothie or a night out with friends.
Good Luck and Happy New Year!!!!