Saturday, December 22, 2007

Surviving New Year Resolutions - Using Goal Setting Techniques to Make This the Year

Ok, so it's not quite Christmastide yet, but it is getting stopping point to the end of the year. Every twelvemonth many people do New Year Resolutions. This is going to be the twelvemonth they lose weight, give up smoking, pass more than clip with their kids, or whatever else they experience is important. This is all well and good, but how often make we hear of New Year's declarations flopping? They neglect to the point where it's go a running play gag in society.

There's no demand for that.

As I often state when it come ups to end setting, choice concrete goals. Part of the job with most New Year declarations is that they're vague to the point of hopeless. Many people desire to "lose weight". Um, ok. If you delve a small spot you'll happen that they were happiest when they were 20 or 30 lbs lighter, or their waistline was 32", or something similar. Which end make you believe is going to be more than likely to be met: "Lose weight", or "I will cut down my waistline from 40" to 32". Trust me, it's the 2nd one.

The other job with New Year declarations is that they're often expansive in scale. That's not necessarily a bad thing, I believe you should take high, but a immense end can be intimidating when you're looking at it from the beginning. Desire to lose 50 lbs this year? That's a batch of weight! That agency that you'll have got to lose, on average, about a lb a hebdomad for the whole YEAR. That tin be mind-boggling for some people.

What about if you put your twelvemonth end for 50 pounds, and then took a measure back. We all cognize that weight loss is usually much more than rapid at the beginning of a diet, so let's put some ambitious ends early. How about losing eight lbs in January (doable) and seven in February (also doable). Well, now you're 15 lbs down in lone eight weeks. That do the large end expression a small less scary, doesn't it?

Your prep for the weekend is to come up up with three ends for adjacent year, fitness-related or not. Then take a expression at each of these three ends and give each a six-month goal, a three-month goal, and a very specific, ambitious, and come-at-able one-month "jump start" goal. After the New Year I don't desire you to worry about your three, six, or twelve-month goals. Just focusing on hitting that come-at-able one-month goal. After you make that, then you can reevaluate towards your other ends with some existent assurance behind you!

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