New Year & Resolutions

     It's a new year, and we are all thinking about the big old question. What will be my New Years Resolution? It's something that most us do every year, yet only 8% off all people who make resolutions actually stick to them(New Years Statics). I know for myself, I have barely ever stuck to any of my resolutions that I have made. One reason why we fail so much, is that we put so much stress on ourselves to accomplish these goals. In fact, we put so much stress on ourselves that we actually set ourselves up for failure from the start. It's like we know we are going to fail internally, so we just set ourselves up for failure without thinking.

When I make my resolutions this year, I'm going think about it in terms of running.  When running,  you can't just go out and run a marathon if you have never run before. Instead, you have to work up and build up to the mileage in order for you to run that marathon. If we think of that recipe, we could better set up ourselves to be successful in our resolutions.

    So when making a resolution think baby steps and take some of these steps to help you make a resolution that will become a recipe for success.

1. Make sure the resolution is for you and not anyone else. A resolution should be something that you want to improve or make better about yourself, and not decided based on what society says.  Your resolution should come from your heart and soul.  

2. Start your resolution slow and steady to win the race. For example, if you want to eat healthier, pick one meal at a time to change your diet, and then move up to two meals, once you have successfully conquered eating one healthy meal per day.

3. Don't be hard on yourself if you fail. As humans, we all make mistakes; it's just going to happen.  One way to help you from continuing to make mistakes is by keeping a journal of every time you fail. When you fail, write down what you were feeling and what your day was like. The next day, aim to get back on track and look at why you failed. By looking back, you can try and find methods or ways to prevent you from repeating the same mistake. As we learned in school (though our politicians may not follow this) is that we learn from our past. Our past is a gateway of knowledge and experience that could help us succeed.

4.  Lastly, I like using Chris Freytag's (of ChrisFreytag.com) 80/20 percent rule to improve your life. If you are able to accomplish your resolution 80% of the time, I see it as a success. After all we aren't prefect, but I say 80% is a pretty good number to aim for.

Happy New Year from The Healthy Munch