Creating a Mindset Switch for Your New Year Resolutions

New Year, New Me

New Year generally means new resolutions. It may include health, style, home décor, trips and travel, experiences, finances, business. The list goes on and on. “New Year, New Me”.

“This is the year,” they say. “Nothing will stop me this time,” they say. When every shortly after, it turns into “Oh, I’ll start next week”, and next week becomes next month, and next month becomes the month after… You see where I’m going with this, right? Now trust me, I am that person, I have 100% been in that place in my life. Where I just couldn’t get motivated. I could not find the drive. I heard from so many people, you need to find your “WHY” and that will help solve all your problems… So I tried it. And I had a huge “WHY”, guess what, I still sat my happy ass on my couch watching Netflix and eating Oreos.

Now don’t get me wrong, having a “WHY” is definitely important. It’s the reason you’re trying to better yourself or achieve some goal. But you have to look at the fundamentals of actually achieving that goal versus just know what your “WHY” is and depending on that for motivation. You have to have a path, a plan, something, to help you take tangible steps. I used to go in thinking every year that I would just wake up and do it all! Then would come the stress, the guilt because I wasn’t doing all I said I was going to do. I would get overwhelmed and essential close down, and then comes the avoidance, where dreams just continue to stay dreams or die. “OH look, it’s now January again. Okay let’s do this for real!”… Cue cycle.

Anybody else? Just me?

SMALL STEPS

That is not the way to win in life, guys. Now, if you’re one of the select few who just kill it when it comes to accomplishing your goals and don’t have trouble achieving them, I applaud you! Truly and sincerely. It is amazing that you can do that. Me, personally, I need those small changes, those little steps that help me to reach my goals. And for someone who is not by any means type A, I really need to focus on getting clear and what I want and how I’m going to do. Not to mention shifting my mindset to help me accel.

Things can get chaotic quickly. So, having a plan and tangible steps will be a lifesaver when life will ultimately throw that wrench. Think about your goals as a puzzle. It doesn’t come all together in the nice pretty image on the front of the box. You have to sit down and slowly work at it, piece by piece until you can finally put that last piece in completing the perfect image. All those puzzle pieces are the steps you need to take, follow, and master before you get that beautiful picture in end.

Seriously, if you want something and you want this next year to be the best you’ve ever had, or hell even if it’s just better than last year, you need to sit down, spend some time breaking apart your goals. SMALL STEPS here people. That cuts out the overwhelm of those big dreams I know you have that just seem so incredibly daunting you don’t even know where to start.

Here are some ideas of what I mean:

– You want to lose weight:

• Look at your eating and activity habits.
• What is something easy you can cut back on, what is something you can add.
• Instead of cutting out all gluten and working out every day of the week maybe focus on some smaller things first
  • Decrease the amount of pop you drink or how much candy/sweets you eat.
  • Go for a walk /do a workout on Youtube 2 days a week. Pick a specific day and time to complete each one.
  • Learn and make 1 new EASY healthy recipe a week that you can do in an hour. Block time out in your schedule. Especially if you don’t typically cook.

• Then once those start becoming lifestyle changes progress it up a bit
  • Decrease how much you eat out/fast food and start bringing some yummy meals from home.
  • Bump your workout up in intensity, add some weights, or increase the number of times you’re working out.
  • Keep learning and trying new recipes.

– Creating a Morning Routine:

• Figure out how your mornings look now vs how you want them to look.
• If you can just barely roll out of bed at 7 am and want to start getting up an hour or even 2 hours early figure out what is going to motivate you to get up. A song for your alarm, your coffee machine brewing sending a sweet, warm scent of happiness your way in the morning, maybe talking to your spouse/roommate about helping you wake up. (Mine loves to grab a hold of my ankles and drag me out of bed… not ideal, but it’s the only way it works bahaha.)
• Maybe start at 30 minutes earlier. Then the next week move to an hour.
• Look at your evening routine. If you’re trying to give yourself more morning time, it probably best not to stay up until 1 or 2 in the morning.

Now I’m sure you’re thinking Chels, that is going to take too long! I want to see some results now! Honey… No. We as a society have gotten so dependent and insistent on instant gratification. This is something I’m working on too, believe me. This is where that MINDSET, I was talking about comes in. You are not going to wake up one day and have all of your dreams just fall into your lap.

IT IS GOING TO TAKE TIME!

It’s going to be hard, probably tiring, and you may even have to reevaluate a couple of times. But once you get there, oh man, you will feel on top of the world! You did it. You put in the effort, did the work, took the time, and accomplished your goal! You have to control your mind and to get to where you want to be.

DISCIPLINE

Okay, now that we have broken down your goals into steps, you have a time scheduled for them so you’re not trying to get 50 small things in a day because that can also be very overwhelming, what’s next? Keeping you in a Forward Moving Mindset.

Working toward a goal is hard. Its going required some dedication and discipline to see it through. It going to eat up some of your time and energy. You need to be a realist about your goals and what you able to accomplish. Worded another way, you have to set realistic goals. Shoot for the moon babe, but give yourself some time to get there. You have the time, use it. Think about it this way, if you’re anything like me maybe this scenario will help ya out a bit.

You have a big goal, like Mount Everest type big goal.

Puzzle Path 1: You try to go all in, no real direction but trying to knock something out to move toward your end goal and immediately start matching up a middle piece and trucking along. But you can’t quite make sense of it. You keep trying new piece after new piece and finally just give up because there are so many, how the fuck are you going to find it… Okay, let’s try a new piece… Same thing though. This is where the frustration and feeling overwhelmed get you. So, you either give up completely or put it off until you have more time.

Now I’m sure you’re thinking Chels, you wouldn’t put a puzzle together like that!! Oh, really? Then why would you expect achieving your goals to work that way?

Puzzle Path 2: You start off finding all the border pieces and separating them into another pile. Then you start putting together those border pieces, the smaller group helps you get a clearer picture of what goes where. Still takes some time but the overwhelm and frustration just dropped from an 11/10 to a 3-4/10. Once you got the framework complete you focus in on an aspect of the puzzle, something big and noticeable. You separate out those puzzle pieces and organize them into their own little groups, working to connect them piece by piece, then group by group. You start being able to see the picture form and keep building on that, readjusting and moving things around to make it all fit together. You sit back to look at a completed puzzle, your beautiful new picture, and your new reality.

I don’t know about you, but Path 2 sounds pretty fantastic compared to Path 1.

Having a plan and having the discipline to follow through on it, is what gives you that picture, that reality. Motivation will only get you so far. You need to have the courage to take the time and do the work for yourself, for your life. Going after big goals can be scary but I personally think, it is even scarier to look back and realize how much time you wasted realizing where you could be now if you had just done it.

No more, “I’ll start on Monday.”, “I’ll start next week.”, “I’ll start when I finish this other thing.”. Do you want it? Go fucking get it. At the end of the day, only you are going to be the one who can achieve what you want to in life. Start today, even if you mess up or feel like you’re never going to hit your goals. Start today! Keep that Forward Moving Mindset, even if it just an inch closer, you’re on your way. YOU GOT THIS!

Make the steps. Make the time. KEEP the TIME. Keep the promises you make to yourself and your dreams. Let’s make this your best year yet!

LIVE YOUR MOST COURAGEOUS LIFE.