By Katie Hoeffelner, Fourth Year, Physics
Is there anything in your life that you want to change?
Feeling motivated by the New Year, many people set goals in the form of New Year's Resolutions, a tradition dating back thousands of years to the ancient Babylonians. However, few find success. In 2019, Strava carried out an analysis of over 800 million user-logged activities, and found a sharp decline in exercise activities during the second week of January. It's common to make a start on your resolutions, only to struggle after the initial motivation fades.
Fortunately, a well-formulated New Year's Resolution can make it much easier to reach your goals. Here are some science-backed tips to make your habits stick.
- Be specific
Many New Year's Resolutions are well-intentioned, but too vague to put into motion. A resolution like ‘start running’ or ‘learn guitar’ sounds great, but unless you have a clear plan to put it into place, you may find yourself at a loss for how to actually achieve your goal.
Instead, try to narrow down your New Year's Resolution to something specific: what will you do, when will you do it, where will you do it? Perhaps instead of ‘learn guitar,’ your resolution could be to practice scales in your bedroom for 10 minutes after waking up each morning. This takes away the guesswork of how to achieve your goal, and replaces it with a straightforward task which will move you in the right direction. Rather than waiting around for the perfect time to start, you just get it done. Psychologists call these ‘implementation intentions’ and research shows that they have a positive impact on attaining goals.
- Use environmental cues
Everyday life involves countless situations which place demands on your attention and memory, which can make it difficult to remember to keep up with your goals. If you don't remember to act on your resolution, how do you expect to make any progress?
Setting up your environment in a way that reminds you of your goals can be an effective way to help you achieve them. For example, if you want to journal more, your resolution could be to leave your journal on your pillow each morning. Before you go to sleep, you'd have to pick up your journal and move it, which reminds you to use it. More general examples of environmental cues include leaving post-it notes or setting reminders on your phone.
- Habit Stacking
Another useful trick is habit stacking, popularised by author James Clear. Habit stacking allows you to slot your resolution neatly into your day-to-day life, so that you never miss it. In ‘Atomic Habits,’ Clear offers the framework: ‘After [current habit], I will [new habit].’
Habits allow you to act efficiently in situations which occur frequently in your life. Imagine if you always had to put conscious effort into your breathing- you'd probably find it a lot harder to go about your life. On the other hand, wouldn't it be nice if your New Year's Resolution came to you as naturally as breathing?
As you go about your day, there are certain habits which you do without fail, and without thinking about them. These will look different for everyone, but can include:
Making a cup of coffee in the morning
Brushing your teeth
Eating dinner
Try to take note of these automatic behaviours. You probably have many more than you think. Effective change starts with self-awareness: first notice your habits, then think about ways you could add on a bonus habit which supports your resolution. The best habits to use are those which happen every day and which you are unlikely to face distractions during or after. For example, if you wanted to become more flexible, your resolution could be ‘after I brush my teeth, I will stretch for 5 minutes.’
- How to keep going
There will inevitably be times in your life when something gets in the way of your resolutions. Maybe you wanted to learn a language, so you set aside 15 minutes a day to study it, and you've been making great progress. However, when faced with deadlines or exams, you end up prioritising your uni work and stop studying the language. That's okay! It doesn't mean you failed.
Many people get trapped in all-or-nothing thinking. If you've followed the advice so far, you likely have a very specific resolution. This makes it easy to know when to start, but it also makes it easy to know when you haven't been successful. If you miss your resolution once, it can be all too tempting to say, ‘oh well, I've failed! There's no point continuing.’
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Evie Greville
I like to reframe these moments as an opportunity to practice returning to your goals when you hit a setback. If you want to be able to stick with a resolution in the long term, it's imperative that you can work around the rest of your life. Be kind to yourself when you fail, but steer yourself back on track as soon as you feel ready.
Featured image: Photo by Prophsee Journals / Unsplash
What are your New Year's Resolutions?
