2020 has been an extremely challenging year (to put it mildly). Are you one of the people counting down the weeks, months, days until the year is over, so that you can start again when the year resets and January 1st comes around?
What has 2020 been like for you? The Royal Children’s Hospital (RCH) conducted a poll (1), which found that although there were some silver linings in 2020, with parents being able to spend more time with their children, they also found that children spent more time on screens, were less physically active, and ate more unhealthy food. I would imagine that these habits were not restricted to only the children.
Maybe you’re starting to think of resolutions for next year to change your behaviours around your health? Eating better food, eating less junk food, losing weight or exercising more? These goals are all common resolutions that people set in the new year, but why do we wait for the new year to set these intentions?
Why wait?!?
What is it about the arbitrary date of the 1st of January that we wait for to make change? Why do we wait to start eating well? Why do we wait to start exercising more? Why do we wait to cut down on the plastic we use? Why do we wait to start to save more money or update your finances? Why don’t we start now?
We wait for many reasons, which include:
We are not ready to change
We don’t really want to change
We don’t know why we want to make the changes
The goals and intentions we set are too hard or not specific enough
And we don’t know how to make the changes that stick
We don’t need to wait – Benjamin Franklin said it well, when he said “Don't put off until tomorrow what you can do today”. But maybe what we need is a better plan and strategy around setting goals and resolutions.
Setting yourself up for success
As mentioned, the new year is traditionally the time that people will set new year’s resolutions and goals for the year ahead, and look forward, with hope and longing, to the improvements that will eventuate. Unfortunately, the majority of these often fail due to:
The goals not being clear
The change is too big and takes too much effort to maintain
People feel overwhelmed and do not know what steps to take
The person isn’t ready to change (2)
So what can we do?
1. Firstly, get clear about what you want to change and why
Start to think about the changes you want to make, and why your life would be different (better) if you made these changes. It will be important to come back to your motivation and your ‘why’ when you reflect on and adjust the changes that you’ve put in place.
2. Start small and build on this
Start small and don’t bite off more than you can chew. Behavioural change science shows that if you start with small changes that don’t take too much time, or changes that are ‘stacked’ (done at the same time) on other things that you do on a daily basis, is the gateway to impacting bigger changes. This way you can be more consistent – a five minute walk you do every day has more impact that the 10k run that you never do.
3. Celebrate your success
Celebrate your success, no matter how small this is. We are more likely to continue to engage in behaviours that give us some form of positive feedback. Learning to celebrate can help us with this.
4. Don’t wait.
Don’t wait until the 1st of January to make the changes that you want to! Identify what changes you want to make and why, and start now!
If you need more help and support to get started, please visit the Courses section on my website and register your interest to be part of a new program to help you create the habits you want. Or if you are someone who likes to explore and learn information for yourself, then I would recommend the following books:
Tiny Habits: The Small Changes that Change Everything by BJ Fogg
Atomic Habits: Tiny Changes, Remarkable Results: An easy and proven way to build good habits and break bad ones by James Clear
Good luck with creating the life that you want in this year full of challenges and uncertainty. I would love to hear how you go.
References
1. https://www.rchpoll.org.au/polls/covid-19-pandemic-effects-on-the-lives-of-australian-children-and-families/
2. https://www.psychologytoday.com/au/blog/modern-mentality/201812/why-new-years-resolutions-fail