A.B.P: How Not To Fail Your New Year Resolutions This Time

So here you are again. Another new year and you’re probably still fooling yourself with that “new year, new me” nonsense. Haha! It’s not that I think you don’t have what it takes to actually become a new person this new year. It’s just that if you expect to become a new person by using words like “new year new me” or “this year, no more blah blah blah”, you’re setting yourself up for failure. 

Now, I can almost hear you protesting, saying you actually have a plan – you’ve got a new year resolution (this is the part where I roll my eyes). Here’s a quick question for you: how well did your resolution for last year work? How many of those goals did you achieve? How many of them became obviously impossible in only the first quarter of the year? Exactly!

I’m not saying resolutions are useless and would always fail. What I am saying is that simply having a resolution is not enough (as you can tell from previous experience). You need to do more than just have a new year resolution to succeed. Thankfully, I have you covered.

Here are 5 tested and trusted ways to transform your resolution from a laughable joke to something you can be proud of at the end of the year:

Think Feasibility

Take a quick look at your resolution. Looks good, right? Great! Now really look at it, look past all the glamour of the new year and the trend and the craze. Truly look at what you have on your list, and determine how possible those estimations are.

Is that really “get a car” on your list? Really? With what you are currently earning? And am I really seeing “get a boo” there? You that never leaves your house?  See, you’re already setting yourself up for another “we move again next year” statement at the end of the year.

Instead of having those practically impossible goals on your list, why not try going for something more achievable? Instead of “get a car”, why not try “increase my source of income”? Instead of “get a boo”, why not have “go out more”? 

Don’t get me wrong, I am not saying don’t dream big. You should. What you shouldn’t do though, is dream too big that you end up getting overwhelmed and unable to do work towards making your goals a reality. It’s better to start with something feasible, achieve it, then set another goal. You’d be surprised how much you can achieve this way.

Get a Game Plan

So you have a more feasible resolution now. Great! Now how are you going to achieve those goals? If you can’t answer this question, you need to get back to the drawing board. Like right now – immediately you are done reading this post. 

 Get yourself a game plan, not just any half-baked plan, it needs to be a detailed one. Fine, you now have achievable goals on your resolution. That’s good. You need to plan out how each of the goals on your list would be achieved.

You want to increase your source of income? What’s the plan? Start a side hustle? Freelance? Start looking for a better paying job? Decide how you want to go about it, and get an actionable plan that can help you achieve the goal.

You want to go out more? Do the same. Decide how you will achieve that goal. Would you start going on outings? Attending events? Hosting get-togethers with friends? Do some travelling and tourism? Give it some thought and create a plan around it.

And obviously, you want your plans to be something actionable as well. What’s the use of having a feasible goal then ruining all that with an impossible game plan? 

Write Stuff Down!

Get that resolution out of your head and have it written down on a piece of paper. Stick it on your notice board, wardrobe, mirror, or wall. Take it out of your abstract mind and place it on something substantial. Don’t have it written in just any book or some piece of paper you would end up misplacing, or simply forgetting about in the next few weeks. 

Preferably, write it on a pretty neat, empty piece of paper (using your best handwriting), and paste it somewhere you can see it every day. You can have it pasted in multiple places: your bedroom, your office, your kitchen, your diary, and so on. Anything to increase how often you see your goals and remind yourself what you are looking to achieve.

Want one extra tip on this? Well, here’s one for you ─ don’t just paste your resolution, paste the plan as well! And paste them together. This way, you are reminded of both what you want to gain by the end of the year and how you plan to achieve it.

Even the bible says “write down your dreams and clearly inscribe it on tablets, so that he who sees it may run with it.

Set Milestones

Now that you have your resolution and plans where you can see them regularly, it’s time to do the scary thing ─ keep yourself accountable. 

You might think you have an entire year to achieve your goals, but it would shock you. One year is not enough. If you let the year run on its own, you would end up achieving nothing. So don’t let it, set milestones for yourself, have a road map that details exactly where you should be at intervals in the year.

This does two things for you: first, it breaks your goals into even smaller and easier tasks to achieve while also making your plan even more detailed, this converts that mountain of achievement into smaller molehills you can easily conquer; second, it makes it easy to check your progress – you can easily know when you are on track and when you need to put in more work. 

Be specific with the details of your milestones as well; what exactly is it you want to have achieved and at what specific date do you want to have achieved it? Check your milestones regularly to see whether or not you are on track. When you are not, double up. When you are, resist the urge to slack off.

Not sure what milestones are and need help creating them? Here is something that could help.

Pray to the Man Upstairs

It doesn’t matter whether or not you believe in the existence of a God, you have to admit that there are things out of your control – things can affect your plans. So pray to whichever god you believe in. And if you don’t believe in a specific god, pray to the universe. My God is always listening, so pray, and I’m sure he’d listen.

So there you have it. Follow these tips and you just might have that car and a boo by the end of the year. Ignore it and well… 

We move again next year.

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