Every January, for the last 4 years, I have written columns about New Years Resolutions. For the most part, these columns have talked about why most resolutions are unsuccessful, offered suggestions regarding strategies for succeeding at changing habits/behaviors, and looked at what the Bible says about change. This year, as I was writing my annual New Year’s column, I had a humbling realization. I will be 40 this year and I have never made a resolution or tried to change anything based on a January 1st urge to “live better this year.” I confess, most of my columns on the topic were a result of research, though I have some experience with lifestyle changes. So, I made a few resolutions this year as a bit of an experiment. A quarter of the way into 2016, I figured I’d share a bit of what I’ve learned so far. I haven’t succeeded perfectly, but I have had some success with some of my resolutions. Though, others I’m still struggling with.
The first thing that I have realized is that the resolutions that have worked the best have been the ones that are specific and can be broken into small, manageable pieces. One resolution I set, then changed, was to lose 30 pounds. What I quickly discovered was that this goal was too large and non-specific. It seems specific, but there is a whole mess of behaviors that connect to it. I revised it to something simpler: “I will exercise for 45 minutes, 6 days a week.” This is much easier for me. It is timed, not overwhelming, and reasonable. It’s hard to lose weight. It’s easy to do something every day for 45 minutes. I’ll confess, that there a have been a few weeks where I’ve been busy and missed a day, but messing up like that doesn’t wreck my overall efforts to develop a new behavior pattern.
Another lesson I’ve learned is that it’s vital to plan when the new behavior will take place. One of my resolutions is to read 52 books this year. It’s a goal that can be boiled down to a collection of manageable small goals, like “1 book a week” or “25 pages a day.” However, I found that this was hard to do with 2 kids running around, work responsibilities, housework, etc. It’s just not that easy to sit down in a quiet place and read. After some experimenting, I discovered that if I didn’t make time intentionally, it wasn’t going to happen. The quiet time I was looking for was on the early side of the day. Getting up 30 minutes to an hour earlier was the solution. I’m not a morning person, but I really wanted to read my one book a week. I’ve finished 20 so far.
The last lesson that I’ve learned and am going to share from my experiment with resolutions, is that when I fail, the best strategy is to get up and keep trying. It seems like the whole town has been sick in one way or another during the last month. I am no exception. I spent several weeks being sick and miserable. I also missed a few weeks working on my resolutions. A part of me got used to not working at them and I began to think: “I failed this month, might as well give up.” However, I really want the changes these new behaviors will bring to my life. So, when I was well enough to start up again, I did. It wasn’t fun, but it’s important enough that a setback shouldn’t stop the work. In a few months, I’ll do another update and share what I’ve learned.
