​Have You Failed Already?

Today is the day to make changes. Most of us have already forgotten what our New Year’s Resolutions were. And, that’s for the best. According to a statistic that I once read on the internet  (and never verified) 83% of people give up on their resolution by the end of January. Have you?
 
Be honest with yourself. Dig back though your past. How many New Year’s Resolutions have you succeeded in turning into new habits that have lasted as longed as you had hoped they would?  If you can come up with even one significant lasting change that you said you would begin once the New Year rang in, you are an outlier.
 
Undoubtedly, you have made resolutions and followed through on them. But, how many of those successes were started in January 1? Resolutions rock. What I am calling into question is the usefulness and effectiveness of New Year’s Resolutions.
 
Here is why I believe that New Year’s Resolutions don’t work:

• Waiting until January 1 to start is procrastination. Plain and simple. If you wait to start it, deep down, it isn’t that important to you. The longer we wait to start something, the more likely our passion for it will fizzle out or wasn’t even there in the first place.
• Starting on January 1st guarantees that you will be surrounded by failure and failures. Because nearly all of those people around you lose their resolve, you will too.
• The holidays are a horrible time to start new habits. Habit forming requires enough order and predictability to be able to stick to a plan. For most of us, the holidays are the opposite of having a plan
• The things we choose as New Year’s Resolutions tend to be things we feel obligated to do and not things we want to do or need to do.

 
Go for it.  Today is the perfect day to start  (or re-start) your resolution. The bad juju of New Year’s Resolutions is in its death throes. Most people have given up or, likely, didn’t even start pursuing change. Today you can start without the hype and the built-in expectation of failure.