We’ve all been there, the clock strikes midnight and you immediately start thinking about that resolution. A week later, you find that you’ve completely broken the resolution anyway. I think the problem is we set these resolutions and come to think of them as a requirement for ourselves, rather than a goal to reach for. I came up with 10 New Year’s Resolutions that are actually achievable for everyone.
1) Cut one thing out of your diet
Instead of making your overall resolution that you want to lose 10 pounds and go to the gym every day, try picking one food or drink that you can stop eating that will lead you to a healthier lifestyle. For example, over the summer I stopped drinking soda and have mostly been drinking water. I knew it was a small step towards a larger goal that I could work towards.
2) Commit to Exercising once a week and that’s it
We all want to live a more active lifestyle and that is not always easy to do in our culture. It is easier however, instead of saying you will exercise everyday to choose one day a week. One day a week of an hour of exercise is not a terrible commitment to ask of yourself.
3) Spend an hour a day on yourself
One of the more common New Year’s Resolutions that gets broken is learning to manage stress. If you put aside one hour a day however, and spend it just doing something that you enjoy. Taking this one hour a day is a great way to begin working on the long term goal of managing stress in a more achievable way.
4) Start putting away $10 from every paycheck to build savings
If you’re worried about saving up some money for the future start small. Taking ten dollars out of every paycheck you can find that you will have built up quite a big savings after some time. This is an easy and less daunting way to start creating a savings for yourself.
5) Try one new food in the year
Just one time, try something new. If you’ve never had sushi try it for just one night. You have 365 nights to choose from. One night of new food is not going to be the end of the world.
6) Go to one new place (even just around the corner)
I know personally I haven’t even explored all of my own hometown. There are plenty of new places for you to go to, maybe even just around the corner. This is a more manageable goal than just very broadly to travel.
7) Pick up a hobby
Everyone who has a smart phone has a camera at their fingertips. You can very easily start just casually taking photos on a walk. This is an achievable goal because you don’t even need to purchase any equipment to start this hobby.
8) Have a date with friends every other week
Committing to one night every other week is a much less daunting commitment than just saying you’d like to spend more time with someone. If you pick a day and time and stick to it then you will be able to easily achieve this goal.
9) Read one new book per month
If you want to read more in general giving yourself one new book per month is a good starting goal for yourself. If you read a chapter of a book a night you will easily be able to read a book a month.
10) Do one extreme thing for the year (skydiving, scuba diving, climbing a mountain)
If you really want to try something extreme I would suggest picking one thing and going for it. Don’t try to do them all and don’t try to define it too broadly. Pick one specific extreme thing to accomplish this year and you’ll have a manageable goal for yourself.
I hope you put this list to good use and that you go into 2018 using smaller goals to achieve your larger ones! Let me know in the comments below what your new year’s resolution is!