I know, I know… you’ve already heard it countless times: “New Year’s Resolutions don’t work.” You’re told they’re a waste of time, that no one sticks to them, and all you’re doing is wasting money on an unused gym membership. However, the person telling you this is probably someone who’s completely against the idea of setting goals or having any concept of a direction in life—and they’re probably not the best person to take advice from. They get to say, “Told you so,” when you drop your resolution in February and feel oddly validated that they haven’t done anything to address their skin condition or sugar addiction in years.
Why Resolutions Fail
But seriously, there’s a very real issue with New Year’s Resolutions. The failure rate is too damn high. Studies show that most people (80%) give up on their goals sometime in February, and only 9–12% of people report actually following through until the end of the year. Now, there are good reasons for this. The first problem is the mindset that leads people to think they should wait until the start of a new year to take action. If you didn’t shape up in November, why would you keep going in March after a long week?
But there’s a much larger problem, which I believe is behind the resolution failure epidemic. The real issue is how we respond to failure. When we focus on resolutions for the new year, we tend to give up as soon as we hit a setback, slowly losing momentum until we reach a state of inaction—the complete failure state. Once we fail, it’s all too easy to rationalize that failure and accept it, ceasing all efforts to try again. “Well, I guess resolutions don’t really work anyway. That lazy friend was right after all. Maybe next year…”
Protect Yourself from the Failure Trap
Resolutions set us up to believe in an “all or nothing” mentality, where any setback is seen as proof of failure. In this mindset, failure means giving up, with some vague promise to yourself of action on a magical future date—so you can forget your worries and move on.
If you want to break this pattern, here’s what you can do: forget the resolutions and create year-end goals instead. Ask yourself, “What do I want to accomplish by the end of this year?” It’s a subtle difference, but it allows you to experience setbacks and then get back on track because you have the whole damn year. You can forgive yourself for skipping the gym for a few weeks or not reading any new books over the summer. The key is to return to the goal when you can. This makes ‘failure’ less of a permanent state and more of a temporary condition. Remember: ‘Failure too will pass!’
Details to really make this process work:
- I give myself until Jan 31st of each year to review last year’s outcomes and set new goals for end of the current year. That way it feels less hurried and I can really think it through.
- Write it down and post it somewhere easily visible to you. The more to read and review the goals the more focused you are and the more aligned you feel to what you are working towards.
- SMART goals are great and effective. (Specific, measurable, achievable, etc) but I always include a couple of goals that are more intention focused rather than outcome focused. For instance setting my intention for a connected relationship with my partner. This allows me to enjoy the journey instead of just the finish line.