Are You Still on the Wagon?

January brings about a great deal of change for many people. Individuals will often make resolutions to stop smoking, lose weight, or commit to some other personal cause that ends up resulting in changing themselves for the better.

To me, resolutions are like diets: things that last for a little while but never make the transition over to an actual lifestyle change. That is not to say all resolutions fail because some certainly do become permanent but this is not the case for the majority of people who often have the best of intentions. According to Healthline, about 90% of all New Year's Resolutions fail.

These failures can occur for a number of reasons. Many individuals set too high of goals and quickly become discouraged. Set reasonable goals for yourself in a reasonable time period. Another problem is that people will often set too many goals and it becomes difficult to focus attention on more than one large change at a given time. Lastly, one of the worst reasons is fear. If you set a goal of running a 5k but have never run a race in your life, this can be tremendously intimidating leading you to not even try.

When setting a goal or resolution, break it into smaller, more manageable pieces. This can help set a series of mini-goals and boost your confidence and strengthen your resolve. Stay strong in your goals, fight to not become a statistic in the 90% range, stay on that wagon.