New Year’s Resolutions: Are We Keeping Them?
How many of us are keeping our New Year’s resolutions? I wonder. I suspect the number is not as large as it could be. That leads to the next question. Why? Why do many of us make resolutions at the beginning of the year only to break them a short time later?
No doubt, there are a bunch of reasons for this. For one thing, we might become frustrated early on while pursuing our new goal. Perhaps we have resolved to lose weight. Maybe we started on a diet that was unrealistic and so we gave up because it was too hard. Maybe we got on the scale after a week of dieting and saw we lost precious little weight, so we quit.
Indeed, frustration can lead us to giving up on our resolutions, on our goals. And then there is the error of resolving to accomplish too many things at once. We may have resolved to lose weight, quit smoking, be more careful with our personal finances and study something new. These are all great goals. However, focusing on too many things at once can certainly derail us from achieving even one of these goals.
If we have abandoned our resolutions already, we might want to reboot them heading into February. This time, we might want to approach things differently: 1.) We can work on focusing on one thing at a time. We can prioritize our goals and focus on first things first. 2.) We can be gentle with ourselves. Yes, we can work on focusing on our goal, but we can stave off frustration by realizing that very small amounts of progress made daily or even weekly can lead to tremendous progress over time.
Good luck!
Image courtesy of [Photokanok] / FreeDigitalPhotos.net
*Authors note: You might see this column pop up online in a newspaper, under the name Both Sides. I am publishing this column here first at CYInterview.com. For a bunch of years, I have been writing newspaper columns. Since my columns have received a good response on CYInterview, I thought I would share it with you. Hope you enjoy.
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