New Year Resolutions to New Year Reality
According to a Forbes article, many studies have shown that less than 25% of people actually stay committed to their new year resolutions after just 30 days, while only as few as 8% went on to achieve them eventually!
Have you ever wondered why the majority of the population tend to fall short of achieving their new year's resolutions? And if you are sick and tired of not fulfilling your new year's resolutions, year in and year out, here are 3 areas which you might want to consider to improve your probability of reaching your goals this year
1. Knowing your why is 10 times more important than knowing the how!
While many people tend to attribute their failure to achieve their goals to the lack of certain resources, it is more often the lack of a strong desire which causes them to fall short on their goals. For instance, when I used to be in direct sales, my mentor would often encourage us to identify our own "whys" for wanting to succeed in the business. For he knew from experience that the moment we were able to discover our "whys", the "how" would usually take care of itself. In fact more recently, I have also had an encounter with a highly successful insurance agent who shared how his sales breakthrough finally came after many years of setback. It was during the year when he had his first child that he became an MDRT achiever. It seemed that the need to provide more for his family naturally led him to work harder than in previous years and he was able to find better ways to prospect and close more deals.
Once again, knowing the why is infinitely more important than knowing just the what and the how. Thus it would always be wise for us to begin the setting of our new year resolutions with the following questions: Why is it important for me to realize this goal? How could I increase my motivation to get it?
2. Start thinking small in order to achieve the big
Contrary to what most people think, I believe there is power in starting small. So often, I have seen people give up on their new year resolutions even before the end of the 1st quarter as they conclude that it is impossible to achieve those big audacious goals. Yet by learning how to chunk our big goals down into smaller goals for us to fulfill, it tends to build up our motivation and momentum towards hitting our final target. For instance, if you have set a new year resolution this year to do at least 100 pushups daily, the last thing you would want to do is to force yourself to accomplish the goal right away. You could potentially start off with just doing 30 pushups a day, gradually increasing them to 40 pushups, 50 pushups. In due time, you would be on your way to achieving your ultimate goal of doing 100 pushups daily. Remember once again that there's power in thinking small!
3. Break the limiting pattern!
Finally, if all else fails, ask yourself if you might potentially be stuck in a limiting pattern? After all, we people are creatures of habit. So unless you find a way to interrupt the limiting pattern, change is unlikely to happen. For instance, if you currently feel you lack the discipline to do your sales calls every day, instead of beating yourself up, think about how you could potentially interrupt the limiting pattern by increasing the motivation to do those sales calls. How about finding new and different ways to reach out to your prospects where you could enjoy the process at the same time? Be creative and have fun!