With the New Year comes a whole new realm of dreams and life goals. We make lists with our resolutions and vision boards to picture where we want our lives to be by next January. Still with all the planning, come February, most of us have forgotten our goals and fall back into our old habits. We fill each day with excuses like “I’m too tired” or “I have so much work to do,” and that may be true but you’re not the only one. Everyone has obstacles to overcome and overcoming these obstacles to tackle your plan should be the most fulfilling part about keeping true to your resolutions.
Now, who am I to preach and try to motivate you to keep your resolution going throughout the year? Yeah, I would be asking the same thing, so to put a little backbone into what I say, I’m going to update the status of my resolutions as we go through the semester and hope it serves as a little inspiration for you (and me.)
Step one. Write down or visualize your resolutions.
Make sure your resolutions are reasonable and doable; you don’t want to become discouraged in the process. New Year’s resolutions are all about making your life better, for you.
Step two. Organize and plan. If working out is your goal, schedule the workouts into your weekly work and class schedule so you can plan other things around the sweat sessions. If you want to eat healthier, make lists before going grocery shopping and plan your meals throughout the day to prevent snacking on junk food. If you want to improve your grades schedule in extra study time every week where you turn off your cell phone and logoff Facebook and Twitter and hit the books hard.
Step three. Don’t become discouraged. If you mess up one day or even one week, that is no reason to give up. Start fresh the next day, changing your life isn’t going to happen over night. Don’t let the excuses and stresses of life take you away from reaching your goals. It’s never too late to make the change you want.
Step four. Make reaching your goals fun. Try a new workout class or make it competitive. Make a new study playlist or go to a new coffee shop. Make your resolutions into something to share with your friends so you can support each other in succeeding.
As far as my goals go:
-I have been paying attention to the nutrition facts on my food when grocery shopping and only buying what is on my list to avoid bringing that extra junk into my apartment.
-I have been tracking my running times and following an online half-marathon training plan to keep me on a set schedule.
-I’ve also encouraged my boyfriend to join my quest so we can talk about our workouts and meals or even run and cook together.
-The above have all already helped me in being more organized as I am trying to commit myself to a schedule which in turn will help me to 4.0 this semester.
-Being more adventurous is proving to be the most difficult to do but I plan on trying new things (foods, drinks, classes), meeting new people, maybe even traveling.
I hope this is that extra push that some of you needed to get the New Year off to a great start, and I’ll be sure to keep following up and hope that we can all make our resolutions come true!