How to Make and Keep Your New Year’s Resolutions

You can get excited about the future; the past won’t mind. – Hillary De Piano

New Year is coming, and this is the time to decide whether or not you’re going to make one of those pesky little resolutions. You know the type I am talking about. The ones you make and if you are lucky, you can keep them for a few months.

Then you break them and feel awful. However, it’s a new year and you can permit yourself to be optimistic one more time. Before you write down what your new resolution is, take a moment with me and see how you can make a resolution that you will be successful in keeping.

To make a proper New Year’s resolution you need to understand the components of what a resolution is. I hope that in reading this, you will discover that the problem lies in the resolution, not you. After it is a new year, and you get to be a better version of yourself.

The components of a resolution.

Goal (your vision).

The goal of a resolution is what you want to achieve in the end. It’s your personal vision statement. It’s the big picture that you want to achieve. Your New Year’s resolution needs to be based on a goal, an overarching achievement that encompasses the big picture.

Means (your mission).

The means are the way by which you reach the goal. There’s only one goal but you may have many objectives to help you reach that one goal. This is where the misunderstanding comes in. If you make the means the goal, then you have limited your chances of success.

Measures (your objectives).

Your measures are where we find the behavioral changes that make you successful in your resolution. This is where we can define the details of our New Year’s resolutions. Often people make the mistake of making a resolution out of one measure. Focusing on one detail in this way is a recipe for failure.

A quick search on New Year’s on the web will reveal more than 128 million results in less than a minute. Looking at these New Year’s resolutions, ask yourself whether these are goals or are just means and measures.

The top hits were exercising, losing weight, eating healthier, stopping smoking, reading more, reducing drinking alcohol, reducing stress, saving money, and spending time with family. This is the list of the most popular resolutions that people made last year.

Examining these resolutions, you can see that they fall under the category of measures. Taking one measure and turning it into a resolution can be a recipe for failure because you have not thought through one important question.

Why? 

Taking the most popular resolution of last year and asking “Why?” gives insight into the importance of this behavioral change. Why do you want to exercise more? The answer could be that you want to be stronger, skinnier, or healthier.

Perfect! Now we have uncovered a mission.

But Why?

What makes being skinnier, stronger, or healthier important? The answer might be that you want to be healthier so that you can enjoy life more; skinnier so that you can feel better about your appearance; or stronger so you can spend time doing things with the people you love.

Now we have uncovered the goal. The bigger purpose of exercising more. This is where you place your New Year’s resolution. In doing so you are more inclined to be successful in your efforts. Hopefully, your success in your New Year’s resolution will feel good and empowering.

Taking a closer look.

There are many components to achieving a goal. These are the means. Taking the most popular New Year’s resolution from last year, it is now easy to see that it has only one part of the goal. If you are exercising to be healthier, then there are a lot of other behaviors that go into a healthy lifestyle. The list can include eating healthy food, taking vitamins, finding an exercise partner, exploring different physical activities, etc.

When the means becomes the goal it limits your natural creativity. When our focus becomes so narrow that only one thing matters, we lose track of the greater purpose. This causes us to measure our success by only one behavior that is isolated from the rest of our lives. No wonder we fail.

By narrowing our New Year’s resolutions by making one means or behavior into the goal, we lose track of the greater purpose. As the saying goes, “Don’t put all your eggs in one basket.” Don’t measure your success on one behavior.

Making your New Year’s resolution is making your personal vision statement. Ask yourself what you want to achieve this year, go through the process outlined above, and see if you can get beyond the measures and means and understand what it is that you truly want to achieve this year.

Taking your resolution to the next level.

An example of a resolution that I often hear from my Christian friends is “I want to read the Bible in a year.” This sounds good. After all, many of us who have been Christians for many years have yet to read through the entire Bible. However, by taking this New Year’s resolution and reconstructing it under the principles that we’ve learned above we can get a lot more out of reading through the Bible in one year.

Applying the “why.”

Why do we want to read through the Bible in one year? The answer could be, “I want to understand my faith better.” Perfect! We can all agree that it is a good thing to understand our faith better. Many Christians have not read the Bible through and therefore are missing jewels in God’s word that could help them in their faith.

But why do you want to understand your faith better? The answer might be something like this, “I want to enjoy and deepen my relationship with God.” Now we have uncovered the goal – it is clear that the original New Year’s resolution of wanting to read the Bible through in one year is not really a resolution at all, it’s simply a measure.

Reading through the Bible in a year is a measure by which we achieve the means of understanding our faith better by which we achieve the goal of deepening and enjoying our relationship with God.

Now the New Year’s resolution looks like this: “I want to deepen my relationship with God. I’m going to achieve this by gaining a greater understanding of my faith. I’m going to measure this by reading my Bible all the way through in a year. I can use reading through the Bible in a year as a measure to determine if I understand my faith better and have met the goal of deepening my relationship with God. Through doing this I have many more opportunities to achieve success in keeping my New Year’s resolution. Reading the Bible, praying, fellowship, and other ways to achieve my New Year’s resolution of deepening and enjoying my relationship with God.”

Don’t give up.

If you have had trouble keeping your New Year’s resolution in the past, don’t give up. It may have been that you didn’t understand how to be successful at setting and keeping a New Year’s resolution.

If you need help setting your New Year’s resolution, or understanding just how wonderful and powerful these resolutions can be in living an intentional life, please reach out for help. Feel free to ask a mental health professional, life coach, or even a trusted friend. Let this be your best year yet!

For last year’s words belong to last year’s language. And next year’s words await another voice. – T.S. Eliot