New Years Resolutions... are not the same as setting goals.

At long last, my second post. How do you feel about New Years Resolutions? I've never really made any before. It seems to me a lot of people fall off the wagon sooner rather than later. By way of experiment I've decided to make some resolutions this year. Keep reading if you want to find out how I hope to make mine a success.

For many the New Year provides a specific moment from which to commit to changing your habits. Especially convenient after the Christmas indulgence period, I think part of the allure, apart from the concept of ‘new year new slate’, comes from the fact that it allows you to indulge at Christmas without feeling too guilty about your gluttony because at the back your mind you know that come January 1st you will behave 'better'. A good week into the new year I wonder how people are doing keeping up with their promises to themselves. Have they set a goal they can achieve, made a plan they can keep up or was it all just wishful thinking? At gyms January is the busiest month of the year in the administration offices. Many new clients sign up. I wonder how long it takes before the number of those showing up dwindles back to its average. How many people follow through on their resolutions? How many keep it up over a longer period of time? How many make a half-hearted promise to themselves and never even (properly) get started? How many of those gym subscribers never go in?

Of course this is assuming your resolutions are in the realm of diet and fitness. Of course not all are; one can also resolve to read more books, go to more live performances, spend more time with your family (in this case you would do well moving up your intended starting date to before Christmas to ensure that you are off to a good start), travel more (or at all), learn a new skill, improve your concentration, meet new people, or even earn more money. What is important to note is that in each case you need to have a strategy to achieve these goals. A resolution literally is a decision to change an undesired trait or behavior. The things we name as our resolutions are our goals, not our traits and habits that inhibit us from reaching them. In order to make our resolutions a success we need to start altering our approach to them. We must think more critically about what our resolutions are and identify and name the cause and not the effect of the traits we wish to work on.

It is precisely for this reason that I have taken some time sit down and consider what my resolutions really are. It is already a week in to January and some may see this as already having failed because I have not yet started. I don't believe this to be true. In my opinion, if you are so stuck on the date then you are setting yourself up for failure. January 1st is just and arbitrary day. Yes, it is the first of the New Year, but it is a day like any other. You can pick any day and decide it is the beginning of your journey. If you are stuck on the date then you are not giving yourself any room to breath and explore. I can imagine this attitude is translated into how you go about achieving your goals. It is not necessary to achieve things by a specific date and it does not mean that you have failed if you have missed a day of whatever it is you aspire to do. There is no such thing as failure if you understand that you are on a journey to reach your goal. The beauty of a journey is its twists and turns. Allow yourself to understand your process, give yourself time to adjust. Rome wasn't built in a day.

So what is it that I want this year? I'm afraid my 'resolutions' (goals actually) rather fall in the cliché sports and diet group. I'd like to lose a little bit of weight. The important question is why. Yes, I would like to fit in those jeans I got a few years ago again, and yes, part of it is knowing that it is simply better for me, but honestly, I just want to look good in my wedding dress in the summer. This reason feels superficial even to me but it is something almost every girl wants and I am hoping it will motivate me till then. Afterwards I will fall back on the fact that I know I feel better when I eat healthy and exercise. Which leads directly to the second point - how to achieve this goal. Luckily for me what is required to achieve this goal is in line with some of my other wishes. For example, I love to cook and I want to try out/create new recipes this year. Why? Because I love to eat and try out new flavors. This will help me in adjusting my eating habits to support goal number one. Second, I love to practice yoga and various types of dance. After moving to Berlin my training has been irregular. My goal is to get back to training regularly. Why? Because I enjoy it and because it makes me happy. What will motivate me to keep doing it? I have found the sports that captivate me; they keep me motivated because there is no perfection only process, yet there is always something new to strive for. Once again this will help in my first mentioned goal.

Apart from these there are many other things I wish to do. I want to read more books. I want to hone my writing skills. I want to take more pictures. I want to dance, choreograph and sing. I want to learn how to play an instrument. So many wishes! The key I believe is to not try to start it all at once. I have not quite figured out yet how to achieve every goal, but I will give myself time to slowly filter different goals in to my process and if it doesn’t happen this year then perhaps it will in the next. Do one thing, do it well, then move on.

Regardless of what goal you have it comes down to finding your method and changing your habits. These changes are our true resolutions. It is not the weight loss at the end of the road that is the resolution; it is the lifestyle changes made to achieve it. It is not the yoga pose or the pole dance trick achieved that is my resolve, but the dedication to practice regularly. It is not reading ten books by the end of the year but finding the time to read perhaps ten pages a day. Don't try to binge achieve your goals. You won't be able to keep it up. You won't be able to kick all your - to be changed - habits all at once. You only have so much will power in a day. Allow yourself time find those food alternatives, concentration methods or exercise forms that suit you. Don't worry about wanting a sweet snack, try eating some sweet grapes instead of chocolate. Try making home made lasagna instead of store bought. Try a new class. Read a new genre. Go out and meet new people. Pick a travel destination because the tickets are cheap and find yourself somewhere you had not expected to be.

In the end my resolution is no distillation of any of the things I wish to achieve. For me, it is all about time. Finding time, allowing myself time, and using that time. My resolution for this year is to maximize the time I have using my goals as my motivators. Lets see if I can make it happen!