You might be surprised to find out that, despite the seemingly strong wills and convictions of everyone around you, more than 80 percent of New Year’s resolutions end up failing before the end of February. If you want to make lasting resolutions for the new year, commit to trying “Monday Resolutions” instead of an annual pact with yourself. These weekly resolutions can help you to reach micro goals that keep you moving toward a bigger milestone — or give you a chance to reach new goals every week to achieve total wellness.
Benefits of Making Short-Term Goals
With each Monday acting as a day to renew your convictions and start anew, you can get back on track much faster and easier after any health missteps you may take. For particularly difficult goals, such as quitting a difficult habit, this weekly reset can mean the difference between making positive changes and giving up altogether. With each reset, you can focus on the things you have learned about the process of adopting healthier habits, rather than letting the failures get you down.
If you do stay on track and reach your weekly goals, the feeling of accomplishment can help you double down in subsequent weeks. This snowball effect of reaching weekly goals and setting personal records can keep you working toward your resolutions long after February comes and goes. The book Traction: Get a Grip on Your Business explores this theory by showing how setting smaller goals of 90 days or less can help you gain the traction needed to achieve much larger goals on a strict schedule.
With each Monday, you will have a new chance to assess your goals and determine how you will best reach those objectives in your pursuit of improved health and wellness. At the start of each week, you can decide to make major changes or simply fine-tune your approach to achieving wellness.
How Monday Comes into Play
Although you can pick any day of the week as your resolution day, Mondays have a link to healthier thought patterns and actions, as revealed by a study by John W. Ayers and his colleagues. In particular, Mondays were the leading day in which people used Google to look up ways to improve their health and lifestyle habits. These searches revealed that people had their minds on improving their health with each Monday that rolled around.
By selecting Mondays for your weekly resolutions, you can take advantage of this natural inclination to think and be healthier. Otherwise, your resolutions may halt in February, or sooner, with the first misstep and an unwillingness to resume anew as the opportunity is perceived as passed with the start of the new year.
Effective Health Campaigns Centered Around Mondays
Your commitment to weekly Monday resolutions will also align well with the campaigns held by organizations that promote the pursuit of improved health. These health campaigns may encourage you to improve your diet, optimize your exercise routines and quit unhealthy habits as a group. With Mondays as their selected campaign day, these activities kick off at the start of the week with focused activities. The Monday campaigns may revolve around taking group walks, cooking with kids, eating less meat and combating high stress levels, depending on the focus of the organization.
With Monday health campaigns, these organizations have encouraged many people to take back control of their health and achieve their wellness goals. You can do the same for yourself by making Monday resolutions for each week rather than a single resolution for the new year. Your weekly commitment to better your health and wellness will go a long way in helping you achieve your goals through this year, the next and beyond.
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