I am seeing a lot of New Year resolutions posts all over the place and I think that is great. We should always be trying to make ourselves better. Here is a tip I have found that is incredibly helpful to making those resolutions become real.

Have your goal, but then write down the action plan to achieve the goal. The more steps you can take, and the more specific they are, the greater the likelihood that they become true. For example, losing weight is always a goal for so many people. But if your action plan consists of “eat better” or “cut out junk food”, I suggest that you may find implementing those things are close to impossible. The more nebulous the plan, the harder it will be to make work. On the other hand, if you have concrete plans, they become easier to follow. If you want to lose weight, an action plan that looks more like this – for the first month do this 1) one day a week do not eat starch foods, 2) eat dessert only Friday through Sunday, 3) add one serving of fresh fruit into diet once a week 4) eat one lunch a week with only a large salad – is very doable with little extra planning or need to do too much else (i.e. buy supplements or special foods, or make a special grocery trip, and throw out tons of food in your pantry).

If you are trying to get more fit, don’t try to do it all by next week. See what small but immediate step you can take today or tomorrow, and then sketch out the following steps. If you are trying to get better at an activity, don’t say “I will practice it x amount of time every day” if you have not been doing it at all. Start small, say one session a week, and then chart a very basic progression. Don’t jump in too fast or too far ahead. Make the steps the kind you can do now with little preparation.

I know some people who are reading this are thinking “but I want to do a lot right away and fix stuff”, and I understand. Here is the cool thing about the approach I have outlined. You start the small steps, and if you find yourself being able to do more, then do it! All it means is that your action plan gets done sooner than you anticipated. It is not a timeline or a plan you chain yourself to, but rather one that gets things going. We can always do more, but we first have to make sure we do something.