Be Wary: Here’s Why Most New Years Resolutions Fail
How We Set Ourselves For Failure by Missing the Big Picture with New Years Resolutions and Long-Term Goal Setting
Most of us who set 2025 commitments will fail to keep them by the end of the year, so studies say (and our personal experience, I’m sure).
In fact, most of us will fail by February.
We can’t even make it 31 days; what’s going on?
Keeping your New Year’s Resolution is much more than setting a goal. If you’re truly committed to changing, deeper work will likely be required to prevent you from failing.
This isn’t to stop anyone from setting a New Year’s Resolution; we all can and should be able to make positive changes in our lives, but it’s clear many of us are struggling.
Why?
It’s what we’re talking about today with tips for long-term goal setting.
We’re Trying To Transform by Cutting Leafs and Not Roots
When I embarked on my personal growth journey, I stumbled upon a book called Atomic Habits by James Clear.
Heard of it? I’m sure you have.
I didn’t make it through the book, mind you, but I did make it far enough to find something that really hit home for me.
The problem with New Year’s Resolutions (most of the time) is that they focus too much on changing behavior without acknowledging the person beneath.
They’re outcome-focused and not identity-focused.
“What you do now is a mirror image of the type of person you believe that you are (either consciously or subconsciously). To change your behavior for good, you need to start believing new things about yourself. You need to build identity-based habits.” James Clear, Atomic Habits.
Your habit of going out every weekend and getting drunkenly wasted, eating a pack of sweets in the evening, choosing Netflix and/or your phone over the gym, making plans with friends and canceling them, choosing the “bad guy” over the “boring good guy,” and saying “YES” when you want to say is “NO!”: All of these behaviors (and many more) are there because something is keeping them alive.
And it’s you.
It’s the beliefs you hold, the emotions you feel, and the everyday thoughts you have. Critically, it’s how your “bad” behaviors (now turned habits) soothe these negative emotions/thoughts and reinforce your limiting beliefs.
SO STOP CUTTING LEAVES AND GET TO THE ROOT.
How Do We Get To The Root?
Let’s use myself as an example. I’ve recently come to my wit’s end with drinking alcohol. It doesn’t bring out the best in me; I feel self-conscious and anxious, and it perpetrates other bad habits when I’m hungover and fragile.
But it’s been a challenge.
Why?
When I’m on my own on a day like NYE, my emotions and beliefs get triggered.
I feel lonely.
I doubt my choices.
I feel bored — because I don’t know what else to do with my time.
When we’re dealing with chemicals, of course, there’s an addictive element here, too. Not many things are going to feel as good as an alcohol-induced night out (just other drugs).
This is all good stuff for me to take note of. I can see that uncomfortable emotions drive my desire to drink alcohol.
Why don’t I make other plans with friends? Well, I feel anxious when I’m sober.
Why do I feel anxious? Because I struggle with my self-worth.
When I’m drunk, the noise is quieted down, which also shows me alcohol is a social coping strategy for me.
Why am I telling you all this?
I want to show you that simply saying, “I’m not going to drink alcohol,” without addressing everything underneath is a huge challenge.
Many of us set New Year resolutions in the vain hope that we can just rid ourselves of behavior overnight. Any “bad” habit is a “bad” habit because it’s being reinforced by something uncomfortable beneath it. In some way, it’s actually doing a good thing for you (albeit in a roundabout way that also makes you feel worse).
If your emotions or beliefs weren’t blocking you in some way, then change would be easy, and the success rate of New Year’s Resolutions would be something like 80%+/-, rather than the other way around.
So, what do we need to do?
Tips for Setting New Years Resolutions:
Build an awareness of WHY your bad habits exist: What beliefs and emotions keep them alive? Where did this bad habit come from? What role is this bad habit serving: is it decreasing anxiety or blocking feelings of sadness?
Have a plan in place for when you remove the bad habit: If you’re like me and want to do more things socially sober, then I need to be able to manage the anxiety I experience.
Start small and build from there (in most cases that aren’t addiction-related, of course): James speaks of 1% gains every day. Why are we going for the full 100%? Diving straight in will lead to overwhelming, uncomfortable emotions and thoughts. Start small and build from there. I.e., I’ll make plans to do something sober with a friend once a week and monitor how it goes.
Celebrate your small wins: Our bad habits are reinforced by negative emotions, and when we replace them with something that makes us uncomfortable, we should celebrate that achievement. From personal experience, it feels great to stick to my word, and I’ll remind myself of what overcoming a challenge feels like to reinforce the new habit. I also remind myself of how icky that old habit made me feel. More on this in this Psychology Today article.
Be patient: Did you know it takes an average of 66 days to form a new habit? This is probably why most of us fail in February: we’re only 31 days in. Also, when our habits are being reinforced by limiting beliefs that we’ve held for years, this will take much longer and may even require therapy.
Seek support: Support from peers, a coach, friends, or a therapist can be invaluable. It can also be difficult if we have friends around us who reinforce our old habits. Jim John, the motivational speaker, says we are the average of the five people we spend most of our time with. Think about that.
Creating long-lasting habits requires changing ourselves. We must find new ways to cope with difficult emotions and address limiting beliefs.
At the end of the day, our behaviors reinforce our identity.
I consider myself a blogger/writer because I’ve written 500 articles. The proof is in the pudding, but we need to cook the pudding first. Don’t jump right in, though, because you might overwhelm yourself. Build awareness as to why this bad habit is sticking around, seek help if necessary, and if you’re really committed, expect life-changing results.
You’ll change yourself as the new habit eventually reinforces a new identity — which is how to keep to your New Year’s Resolution or any long-term goal.
Thank you for reading this article! I hope you all have a wonderful day and achieve amazing things in 2025.