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The period before a new year –following the Xmas holidays–is often a time of relaxation, reflection, and for some people, a time to make resolutions. As this blog is about giving you evidence-based advice, the topic of my first blog for 2024 is all about how you can achieve what you set out to do in 2024.

Firstly, why make a new year resolution? Can’t you simply make plans at any time during the year? Research tells us that timing is everything. In fact, a study from the Journal of Clinical Psychology found that if you made a resolution at the beginning of the year, you were more than 10 times likely to achieve your goals when compared to those that began later: 46% v 4%. This is because landmarks such as important dates on a calendar create psychological differences between our past and future, thereby motivating us achieve our aspirations.

Having said this, achieving resolutions is not easy and the following methods have shown to increase your success rate in reaching your DREAM. 

D: Define your goal with specifics

This means asking yourself to analyse your goal and then plan it out. For example, if your goal is to lose 12 kgs over the year, then you must set yourself incremental steps of losing 1 kg a month. You have to ask yourself: What are the resources I need for this (e.g., a dietician or a gym membership)? What is my deadline and timeframe?

R: Be realistic

This involves setting small realistic steps. For example if your goal is finishing a degree or qualification, instead of thinking about the final goal, plan out the number of papers you can realistically manage a year, or the hours of study time you can set aside a day or week. A research study from the Stanford Business School has shown that the structure of setting such sub-goals enhances your sense of attainability and motivation.

E: Enlist a friend to oversee your diary or journal weekly

Gail Matthews, a Professor at Dominican University of California Department of Psychology, conducted a study where people were divided into 5 groups that were assigned the following methods of achieving their goals.

Group 1: Thinking about their goals and writing a plan.

Group 2: As in Group 1 and additionally keeping a diary with regular updates.

Group 3: Keeping diary as in Group 2 but also adding in regular commitments.

Group 4: Keeping diary, adding commitments, and sharing with a friend.

Group 5: Keeping diary, adding commitments, sharing with a friend, and also sending weekly progress reports to this friend.

The study showed the following percentages of success (defined as either accomplishing their full goal or more than half):  Group 1: 43% Group 4: 62% Group 5: 76%

Therefore keeping a journal, making regular commitments to action, and having regular mentorship or oversight helps. 

A: Accept failure only once

If your goal was going to the gym or stopping drinking, then one missed day is alright. Realise that two in a row may lead to it becoming a habit so make it a rule that you will accept a failure or deviation from your plan only once at a time but never consecutively. 

M: Make your goal your personal identity

If you want to stop smoking, don’t just think of stopping smoking but visualise yourself as a non-smoker, and what you would do with the extra cash or where you would socialise. Similarly, if your plan is to write a book, then do what writers do—read a lot, write regularly, and if needed, join writing groups. I was in Ireland a few years ago at the Dalkey Book Festival and was asked to speak –where else but in an Irish pub called Finnegans! — at a session titled: Who’d be a Writer? Don’t Quit the Day Job. I famously—half in jest—diagnosed the “Writers’ Block” as laziness. The secret of success in any field is repetition which leads to skill development, I remember saying. The more you do something every day, the more you reinforce your own personal identity associated with it and the better you become. 

Since ancient times, humans have set goals, often synchronised as a dream. Everything was considered destiny or pre-ordained in our stars. Research now shows that old-fashioned measures—making goals, writing them down, discussing them with peers, and not accepting more than the occasional slip-up can function as a GPS navigation system stopping us from losing our way.

THE END