{"id":22199,"date":"2025-01-07T10:00:13","date_gmt":"2025-01-07T15:00:13","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/thehappyhousewife.com\/real-life\/?p=22199"},"modified":"2025-01-07T16:05:52","modified_gmt":"2025-01-07T21:05:52","slug":"how-to-stick-with-your-new-years-resolutions","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/thehappyhousewife.com\/real-life\/how-to-stick-with-your-new-years-resolutions\/","title":{"rendered":"How to Keep Your New Year’s Resolutions"},"content":{"rendered":"

Every new year millions of people make resolutions to get organized, simplify, lose weight, exercise more, spend less time on their phones, save money, etc.<\/p>\n

The reality is only about 8% of people succeed in keeping their resolutions. Why do so many people, who have great intentions\u00a0fail?<\/span><\/span><\/p>\n

The problem is most people have a laundry list of things they want to change or improve each year and the goals aren’t very specific.<\/p>\n

For example, one year I decided I wanted to simplify my life. That’s a great goal because who really wants a more complicated life?<\/p>\n

But how could I actually simplify things<\/a>?\u00a0<\/span><\/p>\n

What I should have said was:<\/p>\n

“This year I’m going to wait 24 hours before I say “yes” to any new commitments so I can evaluate whether or not it is worth saying yes to.”<\/p>\n

In order to keep your resolutions, you need can’t just say you want to get organized or lose weight. You need a plan.<\/p>\n

\"\"<\/p>\n

How to Keep Your Resolutions<\/h1>\n

Be specific<\/span><\/h2>\n

It is easy to say, \u201cI want to get in shape<\/a>\u201d but it is actually hard to get in shape.<\/span><\/span><\/p>\n

A few years ago I decided that I would always take the stairs if possible. Taking the stairs is something specific I could do to move towards a healthier lifestyle.<\/p>\n

It was also achievable. I\u2019m in good health, so going up and down stairs\u00a0was something I was capable of doing.<\/p>\n

\"Making<\/a><\/p>\n

Sometimes I would\u00a0get winded, but I resolved to get in better shape so that going up a few flights of stairs was no problem.<\/p>\n

Today I can easily carry luggage up and down the stairs at the airport without breaking a sweat. The small change of taking the stairs, triggered other changes in my life. I didn\u2019t want to get sweaty and gross walking up the stairs so I\u00a0focused more on my physical fitness.<\/p>\n

Make them achievable<\/span><\/h2>\n

When thinking about setting resolutions, try to come up with specific and achievable goals.<\/p>\n

If you want to get organized, take an afternoon to create an organizing pla<\/a>n<\/a>.\u00a0Instead of writing down, “organize house” write down “organize pantry”<\/span><\/span> or “clean out coat closet”<\/p>\n

Set a goal of organizing one specific space a week (or a day).<\/p>\n

\"how<\/a><\/p>\n

Everyone is capable of organizing spaces one at a time by making a few small changes to your daily or weekly routine.<\/p>\n

If you aren’t naturally organized check out a book at the library for motivation or purchase a daily\/ weekly checklist. Ask one of your super organized friends to come over and help you get started.<\/p>\n

Make sure the goals you set are ones you have the ability to reach.<\/span><\/span><\/p>\n

Be accountable<\/span><\/h2>\n

When I started to get fit<\/a>, I did not like going to the gym. I hated it. I decided to hire a trainer to keep me accountable.<\/p>\n

Not everyone can afford a trainer (I needed one due to a previous back surgery) but everyone needs someone to hold them accountable.<\/span><\/p>\n

\"photo<\/a><\/p>\n

Share your goals with a friend or family member so they can check up on you and maybe even work towards those goals with you.<\/p>\n

I\u2019ve found that with every big accomplishment in my life, there has been someone\u00a0that was constantly checking up on me making sure I stayed on track.<\/p>\n\n\n

Make it enjoyable<\/strong><\/h2>\n\n\n\n

If you absolutely hate what you are doing, chances are you are going to try and avoid doing it at all costs.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

If you hate to cook, you probably are not going to want to menu plan<\/a> and make dinner seven nights a week. <\/p>\n\n\n\n

I like to build in little rewards to motivate me to do things I don’t love to do.<\/strong> So if I hated to cook I would probably reward myself with two nights off a week (either go out or have the kids make sandwiches for themselves) if I cooked the other five nights. <\/p>\n\n\n\n

Or I would find out how much money I saved by cooking at home and use the extra funds to do something fun like take a weekend vacation or buy something fun for the house. <\/p>\n\n\n\n

A few years ago I stopped making resolutions.<\/strong><\/em> I decided instead to evaluate my schedule\/ life every month and decide what I needed to focus on. For example this month I decided to focus on making dinner every night.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

This is actually quite challenging since my girls have practice every night of the week from 5:30-7:30pm. However I realized that because of these practices my family was eating way to many frozen pizzas and junk food. <\/strong><\/em><\/p>\n\n\n\n

I looked at my schedule and realized there were some nights we could eat dinner at 4:30 and other days the child with practice could either take dinner with them to practice or eat when they got home. <\/p>\n\n\n\n

These dinners aren’t fancy (chicken, tacos, spaghetti) but I’m getting into a routine and finding out what works for our schedule. <\/p>\n\n\n\n

I anticipate by the end of the month I’ll have figured out how to make it work with our crazy practice schedule. I might not make dinner every single night of 2025 (and I don’t want to, lol) but I will have created a system and routine that allows me to make dinner more often than not.\u00a0<\/em><\/strong><\/p>\n\n\n\n

Next month I’ll be in a routine of making dinner more frequently and be able to focus on the next project. <\/p>\n\n\n\n

<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

Every new year millions of people make resolutions to get organized, simplify, lose weight, exercise more, spend less time on their phones, save money, etc. The reality is only about 8% of people succeed in keeping their resolutions. Why do so many people, who have great intentions\u00a0fail? The problem is most people have a laundry […]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":23101,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"_genesis_hide_title":false,"_genesis_hide_breadcrumbs":false,"_genesis_hide_singular_image":false,"_genesis_hide_footer_widgets":false,"_genesis_custom_body_class":"","_genesis_custom_post_class":"","_genesis_layout":"","footnotes":""},"categories":[2794],"tags":[],"class_list":{"0":"post-22199","1":"post","2":"type-post","3":"status-publish","4":"format-standard","5":"has-post-thumbnail","7":"category-health-journal","8":"entry"},"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/thehappyhousewife.com\/real-life\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/22199","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/thehappyhousewife.com\/real-life\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/thehappyhousewife.com\/real-life\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/thehappyhousewife.com\/real-life\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/1"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/thehappyhousewife.com\/real-life\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=22199"}],"version-history":[{"count":22,"href":"https:\/\/thehappyhousewife.com\/real-life\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/22199\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":23669,"href":"https:\/\/thehappyhousewife.com\/real-life\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/22199\/revisions\/23669"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/thehappyhousewife.com\/real-life\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/23101"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/thehappyhousewife.com\/real-life\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=22199"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/thehappyhousewife.com\/real-life\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=22199"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/thehappyhousewife.com\/real-life\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=22199"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}