The promise of starting anew in January gives us all hope to try to be better versions of ourselves. However, 25% of us who made resolutions lose steam just seven days later – right about now. If that’s you, then you should know there is no harm in adjusting your goals. It’s better than not meeting them at all.
It turns out that there’s a scientific reason why we repeatedly make and break resolutions. Social science researchers have named this tendency “False Hope Syndrome”: because we believe self-change is easy, we set high expectations that aren’t realistic.
If you’ve already begun missing the mark on the intentions you set in the New Year, ask yourself why. From here, tailor your goals accordingly. While false hope may putter out after several days, realistic hope is far more likely to endure.
Consider Mark Zuckerberg’s personal resolutions for this year, which he shared on Facebook. He announced his determination to run 365 miles in 2016, the equivalent of over 10 marathons. Zuckerberg set up a Facebook page and invited fans to join his quest.
If I had only read the first few lines of his intention, I might have assumed he would join the other 92% of people who don’t follow through with their New Year’s vows. However, he pointed out that 365 miles is just one mile per day, which is approximately only 10 to 12 minutes of daily running. He broke down his goal into bite-sized pieces – that realism is the right attitude towards resolutions.
Many people tend to hold themselves back from success with larger-than-life aspirations. “I’m joining the Paleo Movement!” or “I’m going cold turkey and forgoing chocolate forever!” are “go big or go home” resolutions, which offer us an easy excuse when we don’t meet our aims.
These overly ambitious resolutions are often the result of us thinking that meeting them will markedly improve our lives. Those of us who want to lose weight especially fall prey to this cognitive trap. We frequently believe that shedding pounds will lead to finding true love, a job promotion or higher levels of daily happiness – but that is far from guaranteed.
Last year, I vowed to run a half-marathon even though I had never run more than three miles at once. Not surprisingly, within one week, I had already missed several runs and six weeks later my running shoes were collecting dust in my closet. But like many people who miss the mark on their wellness goals, I interpreted my failure as inevitable. But, really, all I needed to do was rethink what is feasible.
This year I’ve vowed to walk regularly and will add in some running as I hit my stride, a profound difference from last year’s grandiose athletic feat. If I had resolved to run another half-marathon, I would inevitably fail. Instead, I’m recommitting to exercising in a way that’s compatible with my physical strength and my daily schedule.
Part of reassessing goals requires recognizing that some bad habits – like smoking, gambling and overeating – often are the result of underlying emotional reasons that need to be dealt with. That makes doing away with them more cumbersome than we imagine. Dr Janet Polivy, a psychologist at the University of Toronto, says this is because the behaviors we’re trying to remedy are intrinsically reinforcing. For example, it’s difficult to ward off sugar completely when one bite of a cupcake releases pleasurable endorphins. In this scenario, we’re more likely to eat sugar again than to banish it from our diets.
Human beings don’t readily accept defeat, but we can prevent ourselves from feeling defeated by keeping our goals small, manageable and realistic. If we break things down and tackle them one day at a time we might – just maybe – taste victory.
