Many people decide to make one or more New Year's Resolutions every year. However, some experts claim that approximately 90% of these people will fail to achieve their resolutions. Many will have given up by the end of January!
They will stay overweight or smokers or in debt for the rest of the year and possibly for the rest of their lives. Another group of people will remember past failures and not even bother to make any resolutions. They will wait for someone else to make things happen in their lives.
However, some people do keep their resolutions. Why do some people fail and others succeed and, more importantly, how can you and I succeed? The following three suggestions might help you both at the start of the New Year and whenever you decide to make a resolution or set a goal you wish to achieve.
A first key step to success is to take immediate action to achieve your goal whether you have made a resolution to do so or not. One reason for failure is that making resolutions for the future can become an excuse for not taking action now.
People often fail to realize that, if they can't take action today, they will be even less likely to take action tomorrow. Promised action in the future soothes current guilt and postpones the necessary action to an uncertain future.
Making resolutions, then, can become a substitute for action. It can become another way of procrastinating. Patric Chan makes the above point well. He suggests a solution:
"If you want to be successful or make a change, the time's now. Decide today. Take action. Not plan to take action next month. If planning's part of your action, then plan. But if planning is a separate part of your supposed actions, then you're going to repeat a history of no-result."
Is planning a part of your action or not? I think it should be since brain work is just as important as body work in achieving many goals. "Fail to plan and you plan to fail" is quoted frequently.
A deadline can help greatly in making planning part of action. The deadline of Christmas day means that those shopping plans or lists have to be put into action or major disappointment will result. You will have to have wrapped those parcels before the guests arrive or find an alternative.
My sister's current method of meeting Christmas deadlines is to hand out presents in the shopping bags that were given out when they were bought. This saves a lot of time and paper both for the giver and the recipient! She insists that "the bag, if it is a nice bag, is as nice as the paper! The stress should be on time and energy and not on the paper!"
Planning the steps by which we will carry out our New Year Resolutions in time for a clear deadline is a second important step on the road to successfully achieving them.
All the talk about New Year's resolutions in December and January can help in creating a decent plan with a clear goal and the steps to achieve it. Make the plan while everyone is talking about their plans and you will have made progress right at the start of the year.
Make use of the optimism that surrounds a fresh start and a new year and strike while the iron is hot in the first few days of January.
Some goals, of course, need no plans. You don't need to make a plan to take out the rubbish or to clean your teeth. You don't need a plan to carry out daily habits like going for a walk or doing a hundred sit ups.
On the other hand, you might need to plan when you can find time to go for a walk or do those sit ups. Walking needs to be listed as a priority since other activities will soon crowd in to prevent it. Sit ups can be done first thing in the morning but can be difficult if you have a hangover!
Some plans can be very simple. A great Japanese marathon runner had a simple plan to achieve success. His plan was to run in the morning and then again in the evening. The plan worked well. He won the Boston Marathon.
A great American athlete had an equally simple plan. He trained when he felt like it and when he didn't. He successfully achieved an Olympic gold medal.
A soldier did push ups all day long for three months in order to get back in shape to meet his wife who remembered him as slim and fit! He met all her expectations!
My daily ongoing flexible plan, using the acronym SOG, is to achieve three things every day:
To spend an hour or more learning a useful skill like copywriting or html.
To work for an hour or more on an overwhelming task that needs daily attention like replying to emails and off line post.
To spend an hour or more working on my current most important goal like writing this article.
As you can see SOG stands for Skill, Overwhelming task and Goal. These items can be performed in any order. Today I have started with G and will end with OS - GOS! You might of course prefer OGS!
However, "the best laid plans of mice and men gang aft agley". Even a good and simple plan is not enough to achieve success on its own.
You could lose your drive - your ability to move forward in a determined way to fulfill your plans. This can happen soon or after months and years of trying.
You can lose that red hot desire for a better life and decide that you are better off as you are. You can lose the energy necessary for achieving more than you have so far.
Other people can fall ill and take up all your time and energy in looking after them. Other people can fail to keep their promises of support. Other people can mislead and con you out of the money needed to carry out your plans!
Eventually you may give up on your promises and commitments to your goals, dreams and plans.
You will, then, need to take a third step to success. You will need to unleash the power of your subconscious mind. Use the power of your subconscious mind by repeating or listening daily to affirmations like: "Money comes to me abundantly from all directions."
You could systematically visualize your goals and resolutions as if they have already been achieved. See yourself looking slimmer and moving swiftly and with agility. Do this before sleeping, after waking up and after exercise when you are in a relaxed state of mind.
Listen to hypnosis tapes which can help you quit smoking etc. Study the law of attraction and give it a try. The law of attraction states that you attract to yourself what you think about most.
To achieve your New Year Resolutions or any Resolutions try applying the following three steps for at least a month.
Act on your resolutions now whether you have a plan or not.
Plan or list the steps you will take to achieve your resolutions.
Affirm that you already have what you want.
If you find acronyms helpful, remember the acronym APA - Act, Plan, Affirm - and apply it daily.
Have a great New Year!
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