how NOT to give up on your new years resolutions

Remember those resolutions you came up with, coming down off the high of a delightful Christmas season and looking bright-eyed toward an emerging Spring?

Now, as a long, hot Summer plods toward a close, how are your early goals shaping up? If you’re like the majority of us, you’ve lost sight of, well, the majority of those goals. But you don’t have to beat yourself up about it.

Instead, join the mid-year resolutions club, give each other a high-five and get set to make change before the end of the year. Here’s how:

  1. Break Up Big Goals. Want learn to fish? Awesome. That’s a big goal, accomplished through a set of smaller, short-term, foundation-building goals, like getting a fishing pole, finding a watering hole, learning about bait, etc. It’s great to have an overarching goal, but success happens through checking off one related short-term goal at a time.
  2. Specify Short-Term Goals. Each goal along the way needs to be specific, measurable and time limited. Want to learn to fish? This week, research fishing poles — use, cost, etc., and plan to purchase one over the weekend. Before you know it, you’ve got significant momentum in the small things toward your big goal. That’s what we call progress.
  3. Remove Barriers. Think hard about what you’ve used as excuses in the first half of the year to avoid making progress toward your goals. Strategize how to eliminate those opportunities for avoidance. Wanting to get in shape and keep finding yourself saying your gym is too far away from you house? Change gyms. Want to drink more water? Buy a water bottle you actually like and can carry around with you. Too busy with carting the kids around to read that devotional? Ask your husband to cover the morning routine so you get 15 minutes to yourself. Make it easy to move toward your goals!
  4. Think and Act One Day at a Time. Trying to lose weight? It happens one eating choice and one exercise movement at time. Not only does this present-focus help us avoid despair, it also reminds us that healthy change is a gradual, habit-redefining process. This focus creates investment — in what we’re doing and who we are. Remember, you're worth each and every baby step in the right direction.

So, what do you want to change, develop, or create by the end of the year? Write it down. Start today. Let’s go.

And if you need a little extra help, MAKE AN APPOINTMENT — that’s what we’re here for!