Four Things To Do To Help You Keep Your New Year’s Resolutions

It’s February 1^st or day 32 of the New Year.  More importantly, it is the beginning of the second month of your New Year’s Resolution.  How are you doing?

• Have you improved your health habits?
• Have you started a mental health program?
• Have you started a physical exercise routine?
• Have you stopped living to eat and started eating to live?
• Have you dropped a few of the pounds you resolved to lose?
• Have you quit smoking, drinking excessively or other addictive behaviors?
• Have you changed your savings and spending habits?
• Have you reduced your credit card debt?
• Have you established that cash reserve in the case of an emergency?
• Have you begun to have better relationships with those you profess to love –starting with the love of self?

The aforementioned questions are among the most common things people resolved to do during the New Year.  Unfortunately, most people have already discontinued the pursuit of their resolutions.  Just thirty-two days into the New Year with 333 days remaining – most people have flatly given up trying to improve on some important and necessary element of their life.

If you are among the group that has not had the type of success you hoped to have when you made your New Year’s resolution, I’m going to give you a couple of ideas that might help you get back on track.

1. Goose the Laid the Golden Egg – In the event that you have forgotten, your well-being is of preeminent importance.  You are in many respects the proverbial “Goose that Laid the Golden Egg”.  If you are unhealthy chances are those around you, those who look up to you and those who are looking for the slightest justification not to be the best that they can be are all observing what you do or don’t do so that they can rationalize their poor physical and mental health. Don’t let yourself down, don’t let your village down – make YOU a TOP PRIORITY and do what you resolved to do.  Not to put any additional pressure on you but we are ALL counting on you!
2. Master Yoda – One of the greatest philosopher of the twentieth century once said, “Try not.  Do… or do not.  There is no try.”  If you don’t recognize this quote it comes from the movie Star Wars: Episode V – The Empire Strikes Back.  The good news is that you don’t have to be a Star Wars fan to appreciate the quote as the origin of the quote is far less important than the meaning.  Master Yoda’s words provide insight as to why most of us have already given up on our New Year’s resolution.  Far too often we tend to start our thoughts and sentence using the words, “I’ll try” rather than the words “I will do” or “I won’t do”.  Don’t say I’ll try to lose weight, believe that you will lose weight.  Don’t say I’ll try to quit smoking, believe that you will quit smoking.  Don’t say I’ll try to get out of debt, believe that you will have enough money to change the future of your family for generations to come.  The simple addition or subtraction of one word from one short phrase can make all the difference in the world.
3. Excuses – Twenty-five years ago, I learned a poem titled Excuses – “Excuses are tools of the incompetent used to build monuments of nothingness.  Those who use them seldom amount to anything”.  There are several variations to the poem but the inference in the versions is all the same.  We all have the choice to be competent and build moments of greatness but to do so we must stop making excuses.  I’m tired, I had a long day, I’m too old, It’s too late, I don’t have time, It’s too hard, It takes too long, blah, blah, blah, blah, blah are all excuses.  Get rid of the excuses so that you can have a body that is the temple that it was designed to be; so that you can be free of debt and no longer be a slave to lenders; so that you and those who count on you and model your behavior can be healthy, wealthy and wise.
4. There’s an App for That – Winston Churchill said during World War II, “He who fails to plan is planning to fail”.  Achieving any goal requires the same strategic planning that Winston Churchill spoke of during the war.  If you are going to be the best you that you can possibly be – mentally, physically, spiritually, financially and relationally – you are going to need to be prepared for battle.  So you MUST have a strategic plan.  Without such a plan, you will spend the next 333 days doing what most of you have been doing…FAILING.  Rather than fail put some of the technology you have at your disposal to good use.  Download an application to your phone, computer or tablet that helps you develop a goal and a plan of action.  Not sure what application to use.  Follow these steps:
   1. Go to Google search, Google Play or the iTunes store
   2. In the search window type the words “goal setting application”, “goal setting application for iPhone”, “goal setting application for Android”, “habit forming apps” or something similar
   3. Download the application
   4. Do it, don’t try, make no excuses, develop and follow the plan so that you can continue or begin laying the golden eggs that you and your village require expeditiously and efficiently.