Psychology hacks for making your New Years resolutions stick
Let’s have a moment for honesty between just the two of us, okay? Nobody else is here, so don’t worry- it’ll be our little secret. Ready? Raise your hand if you’ve fallen off of your New Year’s resolution already.
If that describes you, no big deal. After all, there’s still all kinds of time to recommit yourself to your goal; the year is young. But why is it that we fall off our resolutions so quickly after making them? Why is it that we lose steam and decommit so often after the holidays?
It turns out that there are numerous psychological reasons for why we fail, and it’s certainly no secret the brain is a complex animal. Today’s article is all about what to do to turn things back around though! Check out our five psychological hacks for getting back on track in the new year.
#1: Be quiet! (I mean that nicely)
It’s natural to want to share, and telling friends or family about positive changes you’re making feels great, but that’s also kind of the problem. According to studies, when we speak about resolutions without having a plan developed or any successes logged, we receive a release of feel-good chemicals in the brain similar to what we do after actually having accomplished something for real. This reward response in our brain can cause us to never start, do a poor job of adhering to our resolutions, or to quit early.
Keeping a goal personal and to yourself instead of broadcasting it out to others early on can help you get started. After all, it’s a personal resolution, so why involve others until you’ve started to make it your new habit?
#2: Think smaller
Studies show those that make a resolution are 44% more likely to achieve habit change relative to the rest of the population. The caveat to this statistic, as the American Psychological Association points out, is that the size of the goal also matters. Goals that are too complex, have too many elements, or feature too many steps are likely to fail.
So start small and pick one thing! It’s okay to just change one thing at a time to start, and it’s recommended to slowly work up to a larger goal.
#3: Physically sit down and plan your resolution out
Psychological and sociological studies have proven that spending time on planning a resolution actually makes a huge difference in goal adherence. Whether it’s setting up an app, creating a spreadsheet, setting a schedule, or even assigning reminders to cue you towards your resolution, the act of physically having to create a roadmap for yourself can make all the difference. So be intentional and get to planning your resolution.
#4 Stop waiting for your habit change to become automatic
In one study, 96 participants recorded eating, drinking, or other activity resolutions by means of a standardized, daily survey. Participants agreed to record their habit success or failure in the same context (during breakfast time, night, etc.) for multiple weeks. Of the 39 who succeeded in their goals and reached linear progression (visual LP as a bar graph line steadily going up like a hill) the range of days it took to reach automatic habit formation was anywhere from 18-254 days.
A habit becomes automatic when it starts feeling set in, but it’s not necessarily true for all individuals that they will reach that point easily. So keep doing the work and treat it as such without expecting things to magically start feeling automatic!.
#5 Reframe failure
The brain is often a jerk when it comes to writing stories about ourselves, and New Years resolutions tend to take up way too much real estate within our psyches. Reframing is a well-studied psychological tool you can and should use when thinking upon your past failures to adhere to a new goal.
Reflect on past failures fondly and consider them a stepping stone to the new you instead of as sources of anxiety. Failures are an essential element of what helped motivate you today to change, so why not reframe them to something positive? Consider the lessons you learned about yourself from that failure and how it helped you grow.
See failure as a tool you can use to determine the best path forward, and don’t avoid reflecting on it while committing to your new habits. The key is to let go of self-punishment and not let failure be the enemy of new progress; greet it as an old friend. It’s up to you to give forgiveness to the person you are now, and nobody else will do that for you.
Be good to yourself in the New Year and join us each week in 2023 for discussions of all things home, family, and better living.
This weekly Sponsored Column is written by Fountain Mortgage. Located in Prairie Village, Fountain Mortgage is dedicated to educating, and thus empowering, clients to make the best financial decision possible for their situation.
Fountain Mortgage NMLS: 1138268
Our comment section is reserved for subscribers. Try a subscription today for just $1
Monthly Subscription
$1 for your first month, then just $8 per month thereafter. Cancel anytime.
Try for $1Annual Subscription
$1 for your first month, then just $77 per year thereafter. Cancel anytime.
Try for $1