5 Things to Focus on Instead of Unrealistic New Year's Resolutions
Have you set goals of cleaning and organizing your house, starting a new diet, exercise routine or starting a new financial endeavor in January? Fallen to the idea of “new year, new you?” expectations and all the marketing hype?
I hate New Year's Resolutions. I’ve hated them since I was a teenager, but never could pinpoint why.
After 15 years in the mental health field I finally understand why.
They are unrealistic and not sustainable. It’s another clever marketing tool used in our consumer driven economy.
They solicit promises of instant gratification, change and happiness. They are vague and oftentimes driven by generic goals and numbers. They are set in “all-or-nothing” patterns. Ultimately, when the diet changes, exercise routine, or financial strategy starts to falter, this promise of satisfaction quickly turns into feelings of failure, shame, frustrations at “wasted” time and money, and increase in negative self-talk.
Ironically, we set ourselves up for failure year after year, and we keep wondering why we arent perfect yet.
Especially in diet and fitness culture, these industries thrive on people failing “diets.” 97% of diets don’t work. But when someone tries a new diet and falters, the blame and criticism turns inward. “I failed the diet,” “I have no self-control,” “What’s wrong with me?”
It’s no surprise to me why so many people, women and men struggle to feel like they can find a way to love their body, when there are such high expectations every year.
Instead of falling prey to these generic unrealistic goals, try these 4 things to help create a more abundant mindset this new year.
1. Self-Growth Mindset
Focus on personal growth, rather than setting specific goals. Define what self-growth looks like for you. In mental health therapy, we often ask our clients to think about their “intentional priorities” when they are trying to define how they want to change and grow.
Use this framework to think about and identify what growth mindset means to you:
How do my thoughts detract or attract from my values and how I want to live?
When do I feel aligned with my priorities?
Where in my mind, body, spirit, and environment do I feel connected to myself?
What helps me feel more connected and aligned with my priorities?
Identifying your intentions helps you focus more on on thoughts, feelings, and behaviors that you want to understand during this next week, next month, next year. You will feel excited about goals this year when you focus on the journey, not the destination
2. Fall in love with the Journey, stop focusing on the End Result
Margo Maine, PhD, says “Your body is the vehicle, it is not the destination.” As mental health therapists specializing in eating disorders, we refer to this concept daily with our clients. But it applies to ALL OF US!
When your goals this year focus on how to fall in love with what you are doing and experiencing, it becomes much easier for you to get back up when you falter.
It allows you to have self compassion and say, “It’s ok I messed up.” I understand why this week was more difficult,” “Next time I will…” This allows you to work through cognitive dissonance that tries to convince you everything is “all-or-nothing” or black and white.
This could involve activities such as meditation, exercise, reading, or spending time with loved ones. BUT FOCUS on these reasons and questions when trying to decide how to focus on the journey instead of end results.
If you woke up tomorrow morning and this change had miraculously occurred over night, what would be different?
a. What feelings would you be experiencing? (excitement, fear, confidence, happiness?)
b. What change would there be in your daily routine?
c. What thoughts would be different? (I can do this, I feel scared, I feel relief, I have a plan for
the day?)
d. How would it change your interactions with people in your life?
3. Embrace Failure
Failure is an inherent part of life. Babies, toddlers, kids and adults all learn and accomplish new things by failing. Resiliency is defined by our ability to adapt in the face of difficult times. Yet, as adults we often want to avoid the pain, shame, guilt, anxiety or other intense emotions that come up when we fail.
So instead of focusing on how to “be” or “do” something perfectly this year. Embrace and choose to believe that you will fail, that it is ok to fail, and that you can learn from your failures!
Kristine Neff teaches us that self compassion is our ability to relate to ourselves and show kindness to ourselves when something difficult happens. When we acknowledge failure, identify how the fear of failure ( or the actual failure) feels in our mind and body, we are more empowered to deal with that emotion and experience.
One way to focus on embracing failures is to journal things that happened that day and how you were able to handle them. For example, it can be as simple as “When I got mad at my kid because they left their back pack out, I was able to catch myself taking a deep breath and apologize to them afterwards.”
Instead of fearing failure, embrace it as an opportunity to learn and grow. Set a goal to try new things and take risks, even if there's a chance you might fail.
The key to “failing” is to get back up and try again, even if it takes some courage to keep going.
4. Challenge yourself to try something new
Instead of focusing on doing something everyone else or the commercials say you “Should” be doing, take an opportunity to make a list of “new” things you’ve always wanted to try, been scared to try, or feared you would not be “good” at.
Make it an ‘intentional priority’ to try something new this year. You could make a realistic goal such as trying it once, twice, or however many times you want to try it. This helps you face fears, embrace life, and let go of perfectionism. Perfectionism is not a personality trait. It’s a defense mechanism to protect us from fear, hurt and blame.
When you make a commitment to yourself to try something new, even if you know you can fail, you are making a commitment to break through some of your own fears and anxieties. You are making a commitment to try and believe and experience that it is ok to challenge yourself, fail and not like something! But at least you tried!
By focusing on self-care and personal growth, you can improve your overall well-being and establish healthy habits that will benefit you throughout the year.
If you are focusing on your health, your mind or improving your life and you need support Mind & Strength Counseling is here to help you find ways to take new steps and see your progress.
