When the New Year rolls around everyone always plans on making this one better than the last and we typically think we can do that by making a list of dramatic resolutions and things to change about ourselves. A few weeks later, our motivation runs out, our resolutions are broken and we haven’t changed a bit. This unintentionally ends up making us feel worse about ourselves. This year, instead of focusing on all the things you dislike about yourself and turning those into a list of resolutions, why not focus on your positive qualities and set realistic goals to go along with those? Here are a few tips to help you get started!
1. Brainstorm: Reflect on the past year and think about what you wish you made more time for. Try making a list of the most important things in your life and think about goals that could relate to them. Some things on your list could be your grades, best friend, dog, health, siblings, etc. Now once you have some things to focus on you can make goals to go along with them.
2. Be realistic: It’s really easy to go overboard when setting your goals, which ends up making it easy to ditch them. Try to keep it simple and only make a few really important ones. Also make sure your goals aren’t out of your reach. For example, if you’re not an athletic person but are trying to be, don’t make “running a mile in eight minutes” your goal. Instead try something like “decrease mile run time by 5 seconds each run.” This way you have something you can actually achieve and you are less likely to get discouraged and lose motivation.
3. Be specific: The main reason people end up not following through with their resolutions is because they’re too vague. When making your goals, make them as precise as possible. Avoid the generic “lose weight” or “be a better person.” Goals like that are hard to measure and easy to ignore. Instead try a goal like “do yoga three times a week” or “volunteer at an animal shelter.” One of my goals for this year is to not eat take out any more than two times a week. By using a number in my goal it makes it easier to measure and keep me on track. If I didn’t define my goal and just said I was going to eat healthier I would easily find ways around it and eventually forget about it.
4. Stay focused: This is the most important part of your goals. They will mean nothing if you don’t actually follow through with them. It may be easy at first because you’re excited about them and not very busy but once the semester picks up it gets difficult. You can try adding your goals into your planner or posting reminder notes all over your room and house so you definitely can’t forget. One thing I have found to be extremely helpful is sharing your goals with people close to you. I told my roommates about my plan to not eat out as much and they decided to do the same. This makes it a lot easier because we work as a team and it’s much harder to cheat on your goal when you have your friends keeping you in check.
Hopefully now by the time the end of 2012 rolls around you’ll have accomplished your goals and enjoyed tracking them along the way. Good luck!
“All life is an experiment. The more experiments you make the better.” Ralph Waldo Emerson
Nicole Przenioslo
