People make resolutions for the New Year all the time, but most often the problem is in keeping those promises alive long enough for them to really make a difference in your life.
This year, try to move away from the idea of keeping a resolution. Don’t put pressure on yourself to keep it.
Instead, treat the new year as a do over of last year.
Ask yourself the important questions like “What can I do to make myself better?”, “What would I change about last year if I could?”, and “What have I learned from the past year?” To get the right answers, you need to ask the right questions.
Here are 8 things you should try to do this year.
Set short term goals within the year
We have a tendency to get overwhelmed by our long term goals that sometimes we give up on them or change them even if those are really what we want in life.
The trick is to set many short term goals along the way.
Plot out your year with quarterly objectives, and even monthly ones, just so you have a continuous set of accomplishments that fuel your drive.
Motivation is a big factor in success.
Be financially responsible
There’s a certain kind of satisfaction that comes from being independent, money-wise. Relying only on yourself for money and knowing what exactly you can and cannot afford (yet) is necessary for your freedom.
You’re not growing any younger, and it’s always a good time to start saving, to start being practical, and to build a lifestyle that’s comfortable for you.
Pick a physical activity
While we’re on the subject of not growing any younger, you need to make sure you’re healthy.
You don’t need to enroll in fancy gyms or expensive classes to achieve a healthy body. Incidental exercises will even help you more than going to the gym once a week, just to say you go there.
Walking your dog, or just strolling around the neighborhood on your own will help you greatly when you do it regularly. Taking the stairs instead of escalators, not using the remote and standing up every time you need to change the channel, things like that will be beneficial to your health.
Of course if you supplement it with a more rigorous physical activity that would be better. But just make sure you move around a lot.
Invest in the right people
By now, you know which people make you feel like you’re worth more than you think.
In tough times, you need people who uplift you, inspire you, and make you believe that getting back up is not only possible but necessary.
These people are the ones who will be the happiest for you too when you’re back in the groove.
They magnify the goodness of the world and you will feed from their energies too. Those are the ones worth keeping in your life.
Let go of the ones whose presence only serve to make you question yourself, your abilities, and your worth.
Learn a life skill
Driving, swimming, and cooking are just some examples of life skills that you could educate yourself about if you don’t already know how.
Learning about them increases your independence and that’s really a gift unto itself. You can never know enough!
It’s necessary to keep adding onto your list of life skills because you never know when you might need to use them.
Learn to say no
Sometimes we tend to say yes to all the things being asked of us because we want to please everyone. The thing about this is that it takes a toll on us.
The anxiety to perform and to be able to make everything possible, even when it’s not, weighs heavily on us.
Remember that your peace of mind is more important than pleasing everyone else. If the choice comes down to it, choose yourself.
Being a little selfish is healthy, especially if you’re surrounded by emotional vampires who have a habit of asking too much.
Be present
So many people are proud multi-taskers, but when you think about it, it’s not all it’s cracked up to be.
Even though you feel like you’re being efficient, sometimes you sacrifice quality for quantity.
Learn to take things slow and to manage your time and priorities wisely so that multitasking is not the default option for you. Be in the moment whether it’s at work, at home, or having a blast with friends.
There’s nothing worse than missing the moment you’re in because you’re too busy documenting it or doing everything simultaneously.
Make mistakes
Don’t be afraid to be wrong. People often misunderstand that fact about life.
Life is messy. It wasn’t meant to be easy or to be smooth.
Making mistakes is a healthy and normal occurrence.
Whenever anyone says ‘Don’t make the same mistake’, that only means you don’t repeat the wrongdoing under the assumption that you have learned the lesson that came with it.
That does not mean not to make new ones. You can never avoid making mistakes altogether.
In all honesty, even the same mistakes are repeated more than once in someone’s lifetime, but that doesn’t mean you’re not progressing.
All changes come from the wrongs committed and the urge to correct them. Make this year count by making a few and not worrying that it makes you a bad person.
It just makes you human.