How to Prepare Psychologically for New Years Resolutions

The year 2022 will soon begin and with its beginning many people will be eager to make their own lists of New Year's resolutions. It is normal that taking advantage of the digit change, human beings try to redirect the course of our lives.

However, it often happens that many of those purposes that we hope so hopefully will be fulfilled in the end do not materialize at all, something that failure to fulfill can cause us a lot of anxiety.

To get them to be fulfilled, next we are going to see how to approach the new year's resolutions, how to raise them in the best way to fulfill them.

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The importance of preparing for New Years resolutions

Like every year, the beginning of a new one is perceived as that ideal moment of change, as the potential beginning of a new stage. Nature does not notice it, but the human species does, both collectively and individually. As individuals we want the next 365 days to be synonymous with a new "me", with January 1 being that day in which we try to convince ourselves that this year is going to be different.

On many occasions, it is not possible to meet the goals that we set for ourselves at the beginning of a new year. What is wrong?

To fulfill the New Year's resolutions, you first have to know how to raise them. The simple part of the list of what we want to accomplish is to write them down on paper, because thinking about them well is something else. There are many mistakes made when making New Year's resolutions and, for that reason, almost 50% of people who had proposed things to do throughout the new year acknowledge by the end of January that they have not compliment. Only 10% have completed them by the end of the year.

Fortunately, this coming year may be different if we follow the recommendations below. There is no guarantee that we will comply 100% with everything that we propose, but we do know what to propose and we maintain an optimistic outlook and self-confidence, the results will be undoubtedly positive in the long run term.

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Keys to raising New Year's resolutions

To address the New Year's resolutions in the most effective way possible, here we bring a series of keys when it comes to raise them because the way we prepare ourselves psychologically to address these purposes will mark the difference. As we suggested, it is not a matter of simply writing down wishes and wanting to fulfill them. No, you have to be a little more specific, specify more and, very importantly, make sure that as of January 1 they start to follow.

1. Set priorities

The first thing is make a list of objectives that we would like to meet so that, later, we order them from most important to least. It is essential to establish priorities and assign a degree of importance to focus more on those who we believe will be most useful to us. As a guide, we can follow the following criteria:

• The degree to which we would like to achieve that.
• The time it takes to achieve it.
• The effort necessary to invest.

It is essential to be as specific and concrete as possible. Aiming to "eat better" is not a specific purpose. What is eating better? Are we referring to eating healthy? Low in fat? Ban eating hamburgers? It is best to make it more specific, such as "every day I am going to eat two pieces of fruit" or "I will only eat pastries on the weekend."

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2. Make a minimal list

The saying goes: who covers a lot, little squeezes. Although we have followed the advice above very well, just because we have 20 very specific and very specific New Year's resolutions does not mean that we are going to fulfill them. Having too many things to accomplish, no matter how specific, is also a daunting task..

Once we have ordered our objectives according to their degree of importance, it is time to establish a limit. The first three on the list must become those that yes or yes we are going to try to comply with, while that the rest will remain as purposes to start only if we see that we handle these three priorities well. If we succeed, we can expand the list to see if we remain as constant.

The best option is to make a minimalist list, with less than 10 purposes and highlighting the first 5 at most.

3. Divide goals into subgoals

The best way to see progress is to break your goals down into smaller goals, achievable with less effort and more concrete than the overall goal. By breaking down the medium and long-term objectives into simpler subgoals, easy to achieve in the short term, it will help us to be clear about what to do.

For example, the goal of losing 20 kilos is concrete, yes, but it is not achievable in the short term. If we want to achieve that goal, we must first manage to lose some weight, such as a pound. What we can do is consider a scale of different weights that, as we achieve, we will mark as a fulfilled sub-objective. The first half pound lost is a first step towards achieving the great goal of losing 20 kilos.

Also, since small goals are easy to achieve, they will become small successes that will keep us on track. motivation and the more compliments we get, the more motivated we will be to see the long road we have already taken route. It is essential to avoid leaving everything raised in abstract goals and without deadlines.

And very important: measure progress. It is highly advisable that in addition to subdividing these goals, we write down every small step we take, whether in a diary, on a calendar or in any other medium. What is not measured can not be improved.

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4. Make a schedule

It is essential to establish a new schedule, prepared from day one, and follow it naturally. Before starting to introduce these new habits in our day to day, we must do what is necessary to get to be able to do these new tasks consistently and consistently. The more detailed and specific our schedule, the better.

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5. Look for accomplices

A good way to ensure that we stick with our intentions is to search for accomplices. For example, if we have proposed to get in shape, a good idea is to join the gym with a friend who has set the same purpose, in order to pressure each other to fulfill it.

Too it's a good idea to tell family and friends we trust what our annual goals are. If they are people who want us to be successful, they will take an interest in our progress and ask us from time to time how it is leaving us, acting as spontaneous reminders that we should be fulfilling what we have set ourselves at the beginning of the year. The psychological factor of fear of disappointing the people we care about plays a very important role.

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6. Get ahead of your own excuses

Anticipate the possible excuses that appear in your mind. Analyze what you do in your day to day and identify behaviors that can become an excuse to stop trying and abandon what you had proposed to yourself at the end of the previous year.

An example: if you had set out to get in shape, don't spend weeks looking for the best or cheapest gym. Decide on the closest and most affordable one, to avoid using the excuse of "it is too far" and, if its price is relatively high, use that as a reason for strength to go as many times as possible.

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7. take care of yourself

At first it may seem that the advice to get a good night's sleep and stay in shape doesn't have much to do with how you approach your New Year's resolutions. It is not by resorting to clichés and set phrases, but it is worth remembering that "healthy mind in a healthy body."

Physical well-being influences psychological well-being, and therefore it also does so in its negative sense. Tiredness and physical fatigue harm us cognitively and motivationally, making us less willing to do anything and, on top of that, making it harder for us to concentrate.

8. If you need it, seek professional help

It is not necessary to suffer a psychopathology to attend the psychologist; In therapy it is also possible to develop very useful emotion management skills to achieve our personal and professional goals. Or if you prefer, you can opt for the coaching services that many psychologists offer.