On Jan. 1 at exactly midnight, I’ll set a New Year’s resolution, and statistically, nearly 40% of the entire country will too.
New Year’s resolutions represent an opportunity to make meaningful life changes, whether that means working out more, pursuing a new hobby or taking on a new job.
The new year brings on hope and the excitement surrounding a brand-new chapter in life, which is what makes setting New Year’s resolutions so special. It brings the feeling that anything can happen as we approach a new year and a fresh start.
So, if these resolutions are based around optimism and opportunity, then why do 90% of New Year’s resolutions fail by February?
Our inability to follow through with our resolutions has everything to do with setting unrealistic expectations for ourselves, resisting major change and having only temporary motivation.
We set too many unrealistic expectations.
Oftentimes, the new joy and excitement of starting a fresh chapter in our lives can cause us to have an all-or-nothing way of thinking. With this, we crave immediate, dramatic change in our lives, and that the only way to make big changes is if they happen at once.
This is the exact opposite of what we should be doing, though, and a huge reason as to why these drastic resolutions or goals always seem to fail.
New Year’s resolutions always seem to revolve around big, transformative changes like losing lots of weight or becoming an expert at a new skill or hobby. How can you expect to accomplish these things with no prior experience?
Goals, in general, cannot be accomplished in just one go. They require multiple, smaller steps and consistent habit-forming to be achieved. So, by taking smaller measures and eventually working towards a bigger goal, completing some sort of major achievement actually seems more realistic.
Take going to the gym, for example. If you’ve never gone before in your life, you cannot expect yourself to immediately lose weight or be an expert at lifting. However, if you commit to going a few days a week and eventually turn that into a routine, you can allow natural progress to happen.
This method of using smaller, easier goals to work your way up to something bigger is a much more effective way to accomplish things, but it also comes down to having the motivation and dedication to build proper habits, along with wanting to make huge changes in life.
Our motivation is short-lived.
Almost always, setting goals is easier said than done. What’s also easier is thinking about it and getting excited mentally to proceed with the set goal. But when it comes to doing it? Our motivation is no longer there.
Psychologically, we get a dopamine rush and a false feeling of success just by setting the goal, talking about it, and telling ourselves we’re going to do it, all without actually accomplishing anything.
Then, when the time comes around to actually doing said goal, we lose motivation and interest, or we try to get started on accomplishing the goal but give up because of its difficulty or lack of progress.
This cycle is closely tied to unrealistic goal-setting. We love the idea of drastic improvements, but when we see no improvement in a short span of time, this motivation is soon replaced by frustration.
In order to prevent this short-term motivation, measures must be taken to focus on enjoying the process of completing the goal, not just the excitement to plan it or achieving the outcome. In addition, understanding why this goal is important is another way to keep motivation flowing and to not burn out easily.
We are uncomfortable with major life changes.
A lack of commitment to our New Year’s resolutions is also caused by discomfort with change. Even if we want to make a big change, internally, it’s very likely that we’re too scared to make the goal a reality.
By holding ourselves back, believing that we can’t truly accomplish the goal, or being scared of the “unknown,” we place ourselves in a perpetual cycle of intention without true action.
In order to incite a major life change, you must be comfortable with the uncomfortable. Learning a new hobby, getting used to exercising more, or eliminating a bad habit are all things that take great amounts of time and effort, and nobody is going to be immediately perfect at them.
Getting comfortable with the process of failure and trying again not only allows us to foster positive change with these goals but also encourages us to grow and be resilient, not only when completing New Year’s resolutions but also other tasks.
For me, my New Year’s resolution is to create a habit of using a physical planner to organize my homework, daily routines, and other tasks, so that I can stay on top of my major responsibilities and keep track of all my commitments.
I believe this goal is more achievable than simply saying, “My New Year’s resolution is to stay organized,” because it’s more specific, gradual and realistic.
Knowing me, however, it’d be super easy to use the planner for the first few weeks of January and then just forget about it. That’s why I’m going to make an effort to allot a certain amount of time every day to fill out my planner, even if it’s just small homework assignments. Then, over time, I know it’ll get easier to get used to using the planner for everything.
By understanding the psychological underlying reasons as to why our New Year’s resolutions fail, we can take a different approach to completing resolutions, by setting realistic, smaller goals where we understand why we actually want to make a change in the upcoming year.