3 Ways to Accomplish Your Resolutions Halfway Through the Year

Congrats! We have almost finished our Spring semester of 2019! As we rejoice about completing another semester and look back on the things we wanted to achieve, we may realize that we set high goals in January and abandoned them not too long after screaming “Happy New Year!” Now, you may be thinking, “I’ll just wait until next year to make new resolutions,” but why wait until next year to achieve your goals? Why not change your thought process and make some mid-year resolutions that you will actually follow through with?

“I go to the gym, I’m already doing better than last year.”

First off, congrats for being motivated enough to go to the gym! That’s a big step towards achieving healthy fitness goals. Ask yourself, “am I really doing something at the gym? Is it actually making a difference?” Don’t get me wrong—everyone starts somewhere and chances are you won’t walk into a gym and start bench pressing 200lbs. You also won’t see huge changes after one gym session, but that also doesn’t mean you shouldn’t challenge yourself to do better. Going to the gym and walking one lap may be a good start, and work harder and harder every time to continue making a difference. You may be thinking that since you go to the gym regularly you will achieve your goals of becoming more fit or losing weight, etc. By actually pushing yourself a little bit harder every time you go to the gym (and without pushing yourself over the edge), you will build your endurance, agility, strength, and help you achieve those goals that you set at the beginning of the year. Grab a friend and bring them to the gym with you for motivation and accountability. When you are alone, you may be able to lie to yourself which will keep you in the same place and make you stressed when it seems like nothing is working.

“I eat healthy foods. I had brown rice in my Chipotle Bowl today. That’s better than how I usually eat it.”

That is the start to healthy eating and small changes can help you gradually have better eating habits. The ice cream, pasta, pizza, Mongolian sandwiches, and everything else in the dining halls can be quite tempting, but changing one part of one meal will not mean anything if you eat unhealthy food for every other meal. No one is watching you all the time and making sure you eat what you need to, so you need to have self-discipline to make sure you have a balanced diet. Trust me, you will feel better having a few salads or grilled chicken in between the chips and queso and pizza!

“I want to get all A’s…I’ll settle for B’s…honestly, if I get C’s, I won’t even be mad.”

With final projects, assignments, and exams it may seem like all hope is lost. This is the time to kick studying into overdrive and not sit back and let it be. Go to the lab hours that you know you haven’t used to your advantage. Try to find students who already took the class for help or maybe hire a tutor. Rather than trying to go back and reread the textbook, review class notes and powerpoints from your professor. Making Quizlets are great and easy to make with the autofill feature, but try making handwritten index cards or manually filling out the Quizlet because you’ll remember it more if you write it yourself. Everyone studies differently, so find the best way for you. Just remember, you may not be able to get a 100 on all of your final assignments, but at the end of the term when you have done all you can do, it is still good to know that you did your best.

2019 may be flying by, making it seem like it’s too late to accomplish the things you wanted to do at the beginning of the year, but it can be comforting to know that a lot of people have these problems! Sometimes we all just need a little motivation and self-discipline to keep going! However, I’ll be honest this whole thing was really a self-drag because we are all in the same boat.

Have a good rest of your semester!

• fitness
• goals
• health
• resolutions
• school