An article in The Journal of Clinical Psychology by John Norcross and others who report that about half of the population makes resolutions for the New Year. But most of us begin to backslide by February, and by the end of the year we are back in the same place we started. What causes this?
There is also research by psychology professor Peter Herman, who cites what he calls the FALSE HOPE SYNDROME. In that condition he believes that we make unrealistic resolutions about changing something in our lives which we don’t believe in. Ultimately we fail and our self-esteem suffers after taking the hit.
For me that observation is spot on. I used to make resolutions about weight and money, none of which were reasonable or specific, and I knew deep down that I wouldn’t follow up on them. Take my diet, for example. With a full-time career and being often consumed with things going on in my professional life it is all too easy to eat poorly. Out on band and choir trips with kids or pressed for time after a long day, one can easily make the wrong choices about food, and I did. I realize now that those poor choices were really an excuse for not wanting to think about better choices or not understanding that great food taste does not have to be unhealthy food choices. More on this theme in a later post!
Author Ray Williams has written in Wired for Success (Psychology Today, December 2010) that our behaviors have to be rewired in order to have long term success in our resolutions:
“The other aspect of failed resolutions lies in the cause and effect relationship. You may think that if you lose weight, or reduce your debts, or exercise more, your entire life will change, and when it doesn't, you may get discouraged and then you revert back to old behaviors.
Making resolutions work is essentially changing behaviors and in order to do that, you have to change your thinking and "rewire" your brain. Brain scientists such as Antonio Damasio and Joseph LeDoux and psychotherapist Stephen Hayes have discovered, through the use of MRIs, that habitual behavior is created by thinking patterns that create neural pathways and memories, which become the default basis for your behavior when you're faced with a choice or decision. Trying to change that default thinking by "not trying to do it," in effect just strengthens it. Change requires creating new neural pathways from new thinking.
So, if you're going to make New Year's resolutions, here are some tips to help you make them work:
1. Focus on one resolution, rather several;
2. Set realistic, specific goals. Losing weight is not a specific goal. Losing 10 pounds in 90 days would be;
3. Don't wait till New Year's Eve to make resolutions. Make it a yearlong process, every day;
4. Take small steps. Many people quit because the goal is too big requiring too big a step all at once;
5. Have an accountability buddy, someone close to you that you have to report to;
6. Celebrate your success between milestones. Don't wait the goal to be finally completed;
7. Focus your thinking on new behaviors and thought patterns;
8. Focus on the present. What's the one thing you can do today, right now, towards your goal?
9. Become physically, emotionally and mentally aware of your inner state as each external event happens."
The key takeaway that I have from this is to have a reasonable goal and put a common sense plan in place that is achievable. That includes developing a support system. or some way to do period checks to make sure that the plan is being followed. Without such provisions it is easy to see why our New Year’s promises to ourselves fail so much; the goals are too big, too non-specific and we have nothing in place to guide us and to check our progress. We say we’re going to change something in our lives, but we forget to ask ourselves how we are going to go about making these changes and what will the timeline for completion for the changes look like. So in the end we either end up at the starting point of a disappointing circle or giving up all together.
In the end we all want to improve our lives. I know that I have certainly been guilty of making grandiose goals with no way to be accountable for these goals. One of the mistakes we all make is to wait until year’s end to start thinking about these failures. Let’s get a head start and start working toward improvement now!
======UPDATE!======
My progress has been more than satisfactory. Most people want to take off too much too soon - that almost always comes back on. In my case I have lost about 35 pounds now since January 2nd - and this is April 20th. There is a long way to go, but a pound or tww a week is all I am asking myself to do - that's a deficit of just 3,500 calories a week. Portion control, eliminating junk food, cutting back o social drinking (which are hidden calories) all have been beneficial, even if I have slipped a day or two in a week with an extra slice of pizza or grabbed a cupcake at work on staff treat days. It's all okay! Just get back on track the next day!
I've learned that the body is a savvy machine, but it can be persuaded to go along with the program if we commit our minds to improving our health. That is the key - our minds! More positive reports to follow!