“New year, new me” is a tale as old as time. We promise ourselves that this is the year we are going to go to the gym every day, fix our sleep schedules, and learn a new language. But, studies show that nearly 80% of New Year’s resolutions fail within the first week. Our collective inability to remain consistent with goals has little to do with laziness. Instead, our misunderstanding of how our brains function results in abandoned resolutions and an inevitable sense of failure before the year has even really begun. However, with a better understanding of how our brain works to build better habits, New Year’s resolutions can and will work.
Multitasking Isn’t Helpful: Start Small (Literally)
Often, we overextend ourselves, trusting that our motivation will carry us through the first few months and consistency will follow. However, unsustainable practices will never last. The prefrontal cortex, which is responsible for problem solving and decision making, can only focus on one cognitive task at a time. When it is faced with multiple tasks at once, the brain engages in the process of task-switching, straining the frontoparietal control and dorsal attention networks. Engaging in a total rewiring of every bad habit isn’t a successful strategy. Instead, make a few small, meaningful changes to your routine. These changes you will both remember and have a greater change of sticking to long-term.
Focus on Intention and Consider Environmental Impact
Instead of focusing on the task at hand, consider why you are engaging in the task. Do you want to go to the gym more? Why? To build healthier habits, to improve long-term mobility, to prevent injuries down the road? When you take the time to determine what motivates you, you connect your new habit to a part of your identity, and studies show that grounding growth in long-term intentions builds better habits more effectively. Additionally, you can fix your environment to align with your intention. Psychologist Kurt Lewin believed that in the case of self-improvement, the environment controls the outcome, no matter how strong one’s willpower may be. For example, if you want to go to the gym but you belong to a gym that is miles away. No matter how much you want to go, you never will. But, the solution is simple: find a closer gym. Apply this logic to your resolution, and you will strengthen your discipline by reducing external factors.
Make Goals Measurable
It’s easy to say “I’ll be more healthy this year!,” but following through is difficult because doing “more” or “less” of anything curbs discipline and makes it harder to measure progress accurately. Making a New Year’s resolution means holding yourself accountable, and a lack of quantifiable data lets you dodge the version of yourself who made the goal in the first place. Trust me, as a literature concentrator, I don’t like numbers, but I have to admit that they can be helpful at times. The best way to incorporate measurements into your resolution is to start small and be specific: “I will go to the gym two times a week” instead of “I will go to the gym more.” Put it in your calendar and write down how long you spent there. Another successful method is to make SMART goals, which are specific, measurable, actionable, relevant, and time-bound. Through SMART goals, holding yourself accountable is built into the very structure of your goal-setting, and I promise that your resolution will become more achievable if you use this handy acronym.
Timing Isn’t Important
Remember: we begin resolutions in a space of optimism—it’s actually built into the very meaning of the month. January is named for Janus, the two-headed Roman god of doors, who always looks in two different directions: the past and the future. Hundreds of years later, during Janus’s namesake month, making resolutions during the New Year has become a way for us to collectively reflect and take action to grow. But, this practice does not have to stop when January ends. Every day matters to build successful habits, and it’s always better to begin sooner rather than later. Don’t wait for 2027; start now!
Ultimately, New Year’s resolutions fail because we ask our brains to do too much, too fast, and without the right support. When we scale our goals down, tie them to intention, shape our environments, and measure progress realistically, we treat resolutions as a growing practice rather than a test we are designed to fail. Maybe this year isn’t about becoming a “new” you at all. Instead, it’s about understanding the you that already exists: how you think, what motivates you, and what you need to succeed. When resolutions are built with the brain in mind, they stop feeling like promises that we are destined to break become habits we can actually keep all the way to 2027 and beyond.