3 Tips to Keep your New Year’s Resolutions

It’s hard to vibe and thrive these days, especially in the middle of a recession-inducing pandemic (not to mention the recent coup). With all this in mind, New Year’s Resolutions may have fallen to the wayside. Which is totally acceptable and totally okay. They’re just resolutions after all, not life or death situations.

However, if you’re still on the bandwagon, this is for you. In a normal year, most resolutioners drop off after a few weeks. In fact, according to the New York Post, most people give up on January 12.

JANUARY. 12.

That’s literally tomorrow.

Why is that? For one, people expect immediate gratification. If their resolution is to lose weight, they want to see results in one week. On the other hand, a lot of goals aren’t unattainable or they’re doing them “for the wrong reasons” (says every Bachelor contestant ever).

Here are 3 tips to help you stick to your New Year’s resolutions.

1. Understand your “why”

It’s important to know what your resolutions represent for you. I want to run a 10K — but why? It represents health and weight loss. In order to run upwards of 6 miles, I need discipline myself to eat correctly and train daily. This goal puts my aspiration to work.

Don’t just set a resolution because you feel like you should or because everyone else is doing it. Decide what you want and why you want it. Then go for it.

2. Keep track of your progress

Whether it’s transformation photos or a habit tracker, make sure you are keeping record of your goals. This way, when you’re discouraged, you can look back at where you started and see how far you’ve come.

If you’re a digital person, there are apps for just about everything: drinking more water, reading more books, etc. I’m more of a pen-to-paper kinda girl so I have a bullet journal to help me track my progress.

3. Break up your resolutions into smaller monthly goals

Does the thought of swimming a mile straight seem too daunting? Break up your goal into bite-sized chunks. Make your January goal to swim 200 yards straight. Then February can be 500 yards. Keep building on your previous months progress and by the end of the year, you’ll hit that 1,760 yard goal!