How to belong to the tiny 8% winning group when the new year’s resolution for 2018 starts

The new year’s resolution is knocking your door again. It’s time to earn more money, be healthier, read more books, or whatever your new year’s resolution can be.

What will go wrong this year?

I mean, from statistics we know that only 8% will reach their goal and achieve what promised in their new year’s resolution.

According to Statistic Brain Research Institute, only 72,6% maintain their new year’s resolution through the first week. After six months only 44,8% are left.

Why is it like this?

There are three main reasons, why your new year’s resolution is going wrong.

Too many – instead of focusing on your real problem (yes, it’s all about solving a problem), you try to come up with a long list of desires.
Too vague – when the list becomes a sort of wish-list, you’re already missing the target. To be specific on your new year’s resolution is an essential part of the exercise.
Unrealistic – to not clearly identify your problem to solve and instead building up a wish-list often lead to more fantasy-like resolutions.

When Business Insider writes about the same topic and what to do to avoid a high failure rate, they recommend to enrolling in an online course relevant to your particular issue.

The truth is that working together with somebody, a course, a coach, or something similar, will considerably increase the probability to succeed with your new year’s resolution.

There are three pillars in a successful new year’s resolution:

Simple, Specific, and Serious.

Keep Your New Year’s Resolution Simple

Simple New Year's Resolution — Simple New Year’s Resolution

Rather than listing out 80 different things you want to achieve within the next year try staying to one to three goals that are imperative to you.

A good idea to start out somewhere would be to review the previous year. What happened at this time one year ago?

If you failed on any of your resolutions for 2017 (which is likely), figure out why it happened. If the goal was important to you, and you would like to repeat it this year, make it more straightforward.

“If you can’t explain it simply, you don’t understand it well enough.” – Albert Einstein

Let the quote of Einstein lead you towards the correct definition of your resolution. You should be able to wake up 3 AM and making a laser-precise description of your goal, and still being half asleep.

A New Year’s Resolution Must Be Specific

Specific New Year's Resolution — Specific New Year’s Resolution

Next thing to do is to keep it specific.

It’s alright to have an overall goal of “be healthier,” but that’s really vague. So to reach that long-term goal, set smaller sub-goals that are measurable. Once you achieve your sub-goal, you can tick it off on your list, and concentrate on the next one.

Another advantage with sub-goals is that you will achieve your goals much faster than if it was only one big general goal. Psychologically you will get more positive vibes by achieving more goals and quicker.

In an interesting article by the American Psychological Association, (APA) the science of willpower is described as an essential variable for the achievement of goals. It is more efficient to focus on a single target at a time rather than attacking a list of multiple resolutions at once.

Usually, a New Year resolution is a relatively significant promise and cutting it down into smaller pieces would then make it easier to fulfill as the willpower all the time will be optimized.

Make A Serious New Year’s Resolution

Make your New Year’s resolution to a serious commitment and not a “Pie In the Sky” resolution.

Even though the new year can be exciting and full of possibilities, it can also be stressful. You might commit yourself to get your old favorite pants to fit again, or changing your job situation.

According to APA 46% of all Americans usually make a New Year resolution. But 45% of the group making a resolution is failing. The good news is that people who make resolutions are ten times more likely to attain their goals than people who don’t explicitly make resolutions.

Thus, even if failing with your resolutions, you’re improving your behavior and without noticing it, step by step you’re getting better each time you announce a New Year’s resolution.

The crucial question is, what is a commitment, a serious and professional commitment?

A plan and it should be a real and genuine. Also, your full commitment is required.

Tons of articles and books have been written about plans, how to make a plan, what not to do and the more you read, the more confused you’ll get.

Not until I came across the Golden Circle by Simon Sinek, I really understood what the foundation of a solid and serious plan is. See my article on the 13th of April, 2016, “What Is Your Why?”

Not until you clearly understand why you should commit to something, you’ll understand what to do and how to do it.

How To Start The Journey Of Your New Year’s Resolution of 2018

Whatever journey you are doing in life, you need to ask yourself:

Which is your preferred destiny?

Ask yourself WHY you should choose the New Year’s resolution you are doing
WHAT do you need to do, to get it happen
HOW are you going to do it – the plan, see my article on the 28th of February, 2016, “How To Convert Your Dreams Into Realities.”
Set a DEADLINE; otherwise, the action plan will tend to fade out by itself. See my article on the 29th of March, 2016, “How A Deadline Makes Your Goal Achievable.”
MEASURE all achievements. The wise words “what is measurable is achievable,” is more accurate than ever.

Your New Year’s resolution journey could be the most exciting one you ever have done. Once aboard and after leaving port, the cruise line will continue to its final destination, without any optional alternatives.

Ladies and gentlemen, this is a pre-announcement for Freedom Lifestyle Cruise Line’s journey 2018 to the Island of Freedom Lifestyle. For security reasons, it’s only allowed to carry the best memories from 2017 in your luggage. The bad, sad and painful memories from 2017 have to be left behind before crossing the security control.

The cruising time will be 12 months, with stopovers on the islands of Love, Joy, Friendliness, Kindness, Patience, Harmony, Wellness and Peace.

For your convenience, we kindly ask you to fill out your personal data in your gift ticket below and have it ready when the time for boarding.