Making your New Year’s Resolution Count

With one month into 2019, how are you going with your New Years Resolutions?

While making a new years resolution is a great way to make sure we stay accountable to our goals, sticking to them can be downright hard! In fact, studies have shown that 50% of people fail by the end of January – just one month in and 88% of people give up altogether! 

So – should be still be setting goals at the beginning of the New Year? 

My answer – absolutely! We just need to change the way we go about it!

A 2017 Harvard Business study showed that out of the total population, 3% of people who have written down their goals are a whopping THIRTY times more likely to be successful than those who don’t! 

They also showed that goals set at the START of the year are also more likely to be achieved than those set later on down the track. 

So – here are some of my top tips for setting goals in the New Year, that will set you down the path to success:

1. Remember: BALANCE

Have you set a specific goal for your health? Is your goal a balanced one?

Ever set a business or financial goal, only to find in the pursuit of it you neglected either your family time or your health?

This is very common because many people only set goals in their career and then wonder why other parts of their life are not working or find themselves very ill or at the expense of their health!

It is best to have a balance between your work and personal life and set goals across each of these areas. The Organisation for Economic Co-operation and Development (OECD) reported that the majority of Australians sought a better work/life balance as their top priority, above health and education!

So in order to see success in 2019, add a health goal to your list to ensure you stay balanced!

2. Your goal should be all about YOU

Have you ever set a goal because you felt pressured to do so, or have compared yourself to what others around you are doing?

This is another flaw when approaching goal setting. Don’t go setting about goals relating to your health because you feel pressured by me or your doctor or WHOEVER.

You should be setting these goals for YOU – WHY DO YOU NEED TO SET THIS GOAL?

Because you want to feel lighter? Sleep better? You want to feel more confident? Need more energy so you can have more time to spend with your family?

So remember, you’re not setting this goal for anyone else but yourself. Stick to your own lane! We’re all running our own race.

3. Language is everything 

Have you ever thought: “I wish I could lose weight”, or “was less stressed?”

It is using this kind of language that sets us up for failure.

By using language such as “weight” and “stressed” – we are ultimately focusing on the opposite of what we want to achieve. Then comes the stream of negative emotions we associate with these images…

When setting goals:

• Instead of: ‘lose weight’ – Think about the target weight or dress size you would like to be, or better yet, think about how much better and more confident you will feel when eating healthier & exercising more. 
  • For example, “I feel so much more energised and confident in my body, now that I have dropped ___ kgs before the year is out!”
• Instead of: ‘less stressed’ – think about purposefully setting time throughout your week where you can simply relax.
  • For example, “I feel so much more relaxed now that I have changed my schedule so that I have every Thursday morning and Saturday morning to rewind and do whatever it is I want! I also set about 30 minutes of time to myself each morning to relax, read, and recharge before jumping into the craziness of the day ahead!”

4. Milestones as markers 

Setting goals is great, however sometimes setting big goals can seem really overwhelming in the long-run, so much so that people tend to just ditch them.

I fully get it – sometimes where you are now & where you want to be are extremely far off places!

I’m not telling you to tone down your ambitions. No way! Rather, take small, measurable steps at various stages throughout the journey to ensure you stay on track.

• For example – “By the end of the year I want to drop 4 dress sizes, eat healthier and sleep better” – is not the most attainable of goals. Even I find it difficult to eat healthy 100% of the time!

Rather, let that be your big picture goal. To get there, we need to set ourselves milestones .

• For example – start with “I will aim to do a cleanse once every 3 months”, or “I will aim to lose 5kgs in the next month by exercising every day and incorporating more whole foods into my diet”. 

You never know, by the end of the month you may be at the stage where you are more atune to swapping unhealthy and sugary foods, with more whole some, nutritious ingredients!

The next month you might want to try swapping out these unhealthy foods altogether!

Remember – healthy eating is a life time project – one that I have been working on for many, many years, and I can assure you, I am still not perfect!

5. Incorporate your goals into your every day life

Have you ever become so busy with the endless list of ‘To do’s’ and the craziness of everyday life that you completely forget your goals & they slowly begin to fall into the background?

Stay accountable and take note!

Go out and buy yourself a diary or journal, something you will use and look at EVERY SINGLE DAY to ensure your resolutions for the New Year stay on the forefront of your memory! Write down your 90 day action plan or your daily/weekly/monthly goals you are going to do to stay on top of those resolutions!

That is why I’ve incorporated a writing journal into my 30 Day Clean Eating Challenge! Writing down these goals is a MUST if we are to stay accountable and keep on track!

PS: Remember to have  self-love goal – perhaps the most important goal of all! And of course, health related goals do count as self-love goals. Quite a few women have difficulty to have time for themselves these days.