Forget Your New Year's Resolution

Happy New Year!

Did you make your New Year's Resolution? Have you committed to going to the gym 3 times a week? Or to getting rid of all your clutter by year's end? Maybe you committed to losing 20, 30, or 40 pounds?

Forget it.

That's right. Forget your New Year's Resolution. They don't work. Generally, people commit to their new behavior for 17 days before completely giving up. A knock in self-esteem always follows. So why bother?

There's a better way.

What if, instead of locking yourself into a rigid set of rules, you resolved to focus on a specific area that's important to you? I'm talking about creating a theme for the New Year.

When you have a theme in mind for yourself, you can continually focus on making improvements in one area all year long. There are no rigid rules and no dents in self-esteem, just a general commitment to remain focused on making improvements. Developing a question that you can use to check in with yourself will help even further.

Here are some examples:

Theme: The Year of the Authentic Self
Goal: To focus on being yourself with no anxiety or apologies, to express yourself fully and develop better self esteem.
Question: Will this statement/action reveal my authentic self?

Theme: The Year of Better Health
Goal: To focus on making choices that will improve general health and well being.
Question: Will this action lead to better health?

Theme: The Year of Diminished Debt
Goal: To focus on eliminating debt.
Question: Will this purchase decrease my debt?

In all these examples, asking yourself a very simple 'yes or no' question will help you build awareness and make good decisions based on what you want to be doing.

I've seen too many clients, colleagues, and friends damage their self-esteem by setting themselves up with unrealistic resolutions that they just couldn't follow through on. If you don't want to be one of them this year, consider quashing your resolution and creating a theme instead.

Got a theme for the New Year? Please share it with us in the comments!

Comments

[mklmsw]

My theme is healthy living, which can then include eating better and less and moving (like walking) more. I can connect mental health to that too, and clearing the clutter from my bedroom will definitely contribute to my peace of mind!
:)

[Breezy]

Our family eagerly took your advice to have a focus instead of an unreachable goal. The feeling of failure surely does derail us. As an ADD parent of an ADD child, its easy to get off track. So we had a family meeting, tossed around ideas and interests and came up with a theme for the year. My husband was leaning towards focusing on relationships, my son was more into camping and nature. I, of course, had SO many interests it was hard to decide. So I came up with one that included everything and they voted it in. Our theme is "Mind, Body and Spirit." We will also break it down to smaller more specific monthly focuses. We will be making sure that every day we do something to help or nurture in each area - mind, body and spirit. Already last night I planned some books on renewing yourself to be read, ordered some music to feed our spirit, and today I rearranged the whole upstairs room full of clutter and stored things and carved out a private corner to create a quiet "Retreat" corner. There is a bed to read on, a lamp, bookshelf for special books and CD's and a stereo. It's not big, but its mine and its quiet and away from everything else normal in the house. Thanks so much for shaping and directing my coming year!!! Even when I am out of energy and on a down day, now your inspiration will have given me a special place to go.

[Jen Koretsky]

mklmsw,
Mental health definitely is health! Congrats on your theme and good luck! Keep us posted!

[Jen Koretsky]

Breezy,
I absolutely love that you took this to a family meeting! What a great idea! I wish you and your family the best as you work *together* towards realistic and beneficial goals. I hope you, too, will keep us posted!

[selmph]

My theme is stress reduction.I am focusing on attainable daily goals, and asking myself if the action I am about to take is moving me closer to, or further away from my goal. I use the SMART model- is this idea Specific, Measurable, Attainable, Relevant and Time-Related? I can't remember the source for this model, but it is really helpful. I have a tendency to take on too much at one time and I know that is causing self-inflicted stress.

[Jen Koretsky]

selmph - I love the theme of stress reduction. That's a theme we could all adopt!