How to Guarantee Your New Year’s Resolutions Come True

Jan 1, 2020

People are great at setting New Year’s resolutions, but not so great at following through with them. Regardless if it’s losing weight, getting straight A’s or winning DECA glass, the desire to achieve New Year’s resolutions remains, but the actions needed to achieve them tend to fizzle.

So, how do you guarantee that your New Year’s resolutions come true? Let’s get started!

Why Do New Year’s Resolutions Fail?

Before I get into how to guarantee that your New Year’s resolutions succeed, I think it’s important to first discuss why they often fail.

Here are several common reasons:

Treating your goals like a marathon and not a sprint
Putting the cart before the horse
Not believing in yourself
Too much thinking and not enough doing
Not enjoying the process

A lot of why resolutions fail has to do with mindset. Remember that as you read on to find out how to succeed.

Five Success-Driven New Year’s Resolution Hacks

Now that you know why most New Year’s resolutions fail, let’s dive into how to guarantee they succeed!

Here are my 5 hacks:

Tell People About Your Resolutions
Make a Plan
Stop Focusing on the End Goal
Know When to Take a Break
Incentivize Yourself

Let’s explore these in a little more depth!

1. Tell People About Your Resolutions

When you’re working on something alone, there is a higher chance of failing.

By involving other people, you’re including them in your success. Your fellow DECA members are there to encourage you to reach your goals. It’s so incredibly helpful to have cheerleaders rooting for you.

Whenever I’ve set goals, telling them to other people has made a world of a difference.

Last November, I told a coach that I wanted to make $30-50k in revenue with my business for the following year. This year, I’m on track to hit the upper end of that figure. Had I not involved others in that goal, I don’t think I would’ve reached it.

2. Make a Plan

You have to spend time planning! It’s not enough to simply wish something would come true.

When it comes to making a plan, I like to refer to the SMART method for establishing goals. If you’re not familiar, it’s broken down into:

Specific
Measurable
Attainable
Realistic
Timely

As you develop your plan, make sure to include elements from each of those components.

3. Stop Focusing on the End Goal

Instead of focusing on your end goal, focus on the process that gets you there.

Let’s say your goal is a 50% increase in DECA membership. That process would include all the recruitment events, event planning, etc. If you can nail down the process, you’re well on your way to reaching your end goal.

4. Know When to Take a Break

I think DECA students have an incredible work ethic. I’d like to consider myself a product of that. However, I also know that when I push too hard, I tend to crumble—quickly.

I remember when I graduated from college and went to pursue my business full-time, I was so eager to get to work on the business. Then, I realized I was brutally exhausted by the whirlwind of the last few weeks.

I took about a week off before diving into the business and it set me up for success much better than pushing through my desire to take a break.

Listening to your body is essential. I actually find that taking a break helps to reinvigorate you on your way to accomplishing your goal.

5. Incentivize Yourself

I’ll be honest… I like rewards. I find that when I’m not working toward a reward, I am less likely to accomplish the task at hand.

For example, I recently decided to start paying off my student loans. To fund that decision, I knew I wanted to make my business profitable. So, I hired a virtual CFO and, in a few months, we made my business profitable, so much so that 50% of the revenue that comes in goes straight to me to pay off that debt.