The making of New Year’s Resolutions is a very common practice among Americans in
general, and it is taken that most Newman students (and, perhaps, even faculty) participate. Unfortunately, according to research by the infamous Taylor Marshall, PhD, 25% of people “give up on” their resolution within a week of the turn of the calendar, and “a majority will not see their resolutions past February 1.”
In order to avoid falling into the pits that ensnare so many who make New Year’s resolutions, we must understand what these traps are. The first common issue is setting an ambiguous goal or resolution. Not requiring a particular action each day makes it impossible to continue the routine, as you actually do not know what your routine should be. Instead, your resolution should be one of doing (or not doing) something concrete each day. Thus, you can determine each day if you have actually completed your goal, rather than relying on results, which can be perceived differently from day to day, dictating whether or not you have progressed. Second, your resolution must be measurable. If you cannot measure what you must do, you will gradually lose drive and not reach your goal even if you technically follow your resolution. Instead, you need to have a specific amount of work on the goal each day so that you can ensure consistency. Third, you must also make sure that this prescribed daily action is doable. If you cannot actually fit the work into your day, no matter how many changes you make, you will need to adjust your action plan so that you can still reach your goal. Fourth, your plan and goals must be realistic. You cannot expect unrealistic results from the little you can do in a day, and you must not get bogged down when progress is not apparent. Similarly, your work should be realistic for you to complete but significant enough to make an impact. Finally, your

resolution must be time-bound. As the year goes on, your action should “ramp up” in some way to ensure that progress is actually occurring, instead of plateauing.
The success stories I have heard seem to support this concept. My uncle’s resolution, for example, to do his weights training daily was not fantastical, but rather a formal establishing of a discipline he always could, but actually did not, maintain. To this day, he is continuing to maintain this routine and only with few exceptions. On the side of failure, a few years ago I attempted to stop eating processed sugar, which I succeeded in until April when I simply forgot. My family eats no dessert in Lent, and I never eat sugary snacks, so after Lent, I forgot why I had not been eating sugar and fell back on questionable habits.
In conclusion, you must make a disciplined effort to take regular actions that improve your wellbeing in a meaningful way. This will set you up on the path to meeting your goals.