While I didn’t make any “New Year’s Resolutions” this year, I am setting little goals and challenges for myself throughout the year. You see, New Year’s Resolutions just seem so prone to failure, or maybe it is just that I have had so many failures that I refuse to make them. Regardless, it seemed far more attainable to focus on a mix of small goals and big challenges.
Why not join me!
First, let’s make some small goals. The idea is to decide on one small change you can make to better yourself. Then define what is allowed or disallowed in order for that change to be realistic in your life. Then it is a matter of sticking with it for a whole MONTH.
My January small goal is to eat less sugar. Here is what is allowed/disallowed to make it work for me:
- I am not allowed to eat sugar based foods for the month of January
- Hot chocolate is allowed since I don’t drink any other hot beverage
- Homemade baked goods are allowed (I need to be able to blog and I enjoy trading treats with coworkers)
- Once per week I can splurge if I so choose (that means 4 times for the whole month, no half weeks!)
So far, I have been doing really well. The first day or two, I spent the night baking just to get more sugar, but it was time consuming so I stopped baking so much. I also have managed to have less hot chocolates than normal!
Yesterday I tried treating myself to a chocolate croissant from my favorite coffee shop near work, it would be my weekly splurge. Surprisingly, I didn’t get through eating half of it before I decided it wasn’t worth the splurge. I am proud of myself because I am a sugar-holic and quitting like this is NOT an easy decision but defining exactly what I could do really helped because it made the whole experience more realistic while still going for a life change I want to make.
Next is the big challenges. These are year long (or long term in general) changes I want to occur. In a lot of ways, they are like resolutions but instead of just saying what I want to end result to be, I am aiming for a specific point. The best way to explain these challenges is through examples so here are some of mine!
Resolution: Lose the weight I gained from my health issues and school stress last year
Challenge: Lose 20lbs of said weight by increasing my exercise and planning my meals by year end
(This is an achievable number and I have explained how I plan to do it, now I have to follow through)
Resolution: Maintain a clean and organized home (never know when guests are coming)
Challenge: Unpack all moving items by summer and have them organized, clean kitchen and bathrooms thoroughly at least once a week
(This mixes short and long term targets, the result if I follow through with just these two things will be a large step towards the ultimate clean home goal)
Resolution: RE-LEARN FRENCH!
Challenge: Do at least one French activity each month AND look into French training opportunities at work
(I take into account my time restraints by setting a minimum of one activity a month and also encourage myself to look at all the available options to improve even further)
Oh, and remember:
Did you make any resolutions, goals or challenge yourself this year?
Share in the comments below!
