Intentions Instead of Resolutions: Setting yourself up for success

New Year’s resolutions began 4000 years ago with the Babylonians, who resolved to return borrowed goods and pay their debts. The idea was that amending the past year’s omissions would gain the favour of their gods for the next year.  2000 years later the Romans offered sacrifices and prayers to appease the God Janus, the god of doorways and transitions, who had two faces, looking back into last year and ahead into the next. January is named after him, and Romans promised him good conduct in the coming year. 

These days resolutions tend to be promises to ourselves of improving ourselves, one way or another. And they tend to be stated in relative absolutes: “From now on I will…practice something daily..…go to the gym once a week…… not eat my favourite naughty snack ….”

But then if we have a difficult week and briefly let our resolve slip, we often feel like a failure: that we have totally blown it, and that’s the end of that! 

Feeling a failure is a real deterrent to getting back on track. After all, if we don’t try, we won’t fail and feel defeated again! Many resolutions end up trashed by the end of January, with some sources giving the second Friday of January the nick-name “Quitters day”. One large US survey found that, although over 80% of people said they were confident they’d stick with their resolution, on average resolutions lasted 3.74 months, and only 1% lasted the whole year.

Setting an intention for the year, in contrast, can help you improve more and more through the year, while forgiving yourself the occasional lapses. We find that formulating and stating intentions for the year is a much better way of setting yourself up for success.

Intentions allow for more flexibility. For example, if you could use more exercise, the intention can just be to “move more” and to find ways you enjoy doing that. If your resolution was to go to the gym but your gym closes or your work schedule changes, that resolution may hit a brick wall. On the other hand, a “move more” intention just needs tweaking to a different kind of movement, and your success can continue.

That flexibility also encourages more exploration, for example trying out different types of movement, to see what you like. If you check out pickleball, yoga and rock-climbing on different weeks they all count as moving more, even if you decide that one or more doesn’t suit you and you won’t be doing that one again! You’ve both moved your body and found out more about what you enjoy, to help you decide which type of movement you want to continue with. That’s double progress. 

And if you miss one week, well, catch up with an extra session when you can fit one in, and then feel good about yourself. Forgiveness enables flexibility, and the chance to notice if you don’t feel as good when you miss a session. Reflection is so much easier when not drowned in guilt, and much more constructive.

Focusing on overall progress rather than individual events gives a much better perspective, and allows for life’s inevitable ups and downs. After all, you are only human, and none of us can be perfect all the time! Setting a reminder to reflect on how things are going each month or two can help us reboot when life has thrown us a curve-ball and our intentions have temporarily fallen by the wayside.

Some projects will take a year, bit-by-bit, so the stated intention may be “By the end of this year I will have…rebuilt my resilience”. For example, people who have been thoroughly depleted by caring for aged and infirm parents, have to pace themselves to keep their life functioning, while remembering to take more time to rest and rejuvenate on an ongoing basis. For some people giving themselves that self-care time takes real discipline. Reflecting on overall progress can be very helpful in keeping that discipline going.

Don’t trap yourself in a blind alley: instead enable your options! If you are the kind of person who does best with a fairly rigid timetable of the same exercise at the same time and place each week, that’s your valid option. Your friend’s choice to try a different type of exercise each month may be theirs.

The idea is that, by the end of the year, you will have made a change that has become a habit*, and will benefit you for a long time, hopefully for life. Each year goes by so fast these days: don’t let the odd trip-up along the way put you off your good intentions for the year. Then next New Year’s Eve you can reflect on how well you’ve done, and think about your intention for the following year, whether it’s one that builds on your previous good efforts, or something that nurtures a totally different aspect of you.

* Change your habits, change your health