LITTLE ROCK — A new year often involves resolutions to improve your health, start a new habit or change your behavior. To best achieve these changes, Brittney Schrick, associate extension professor and family life specialist in the University of Arkansas Agricultural System Division, recommends setting SMART goals by making sure they are specific, measurable, achievable, relevant and urgent.
One of the biggest obstacles people face when trying to start a new habit is “expecting to be perfect from the start,” Schrick said.
“Often, if we ‘fail’ at something, we give up,” she said. “What is lost here is the idea that practice is necessary. It can’t be an all-or-nothing attitude, and that’s usually how we approach New Year’s resolutions. Give yourself some grace and give yourself the opportunity to start over a few times.
Schrick said when making a change, it doesn’t have to happen on a Monday, or the first of the month or calendar year. It could be anytime, any day. “You can just decide, ‘I need to commit to this again,'” she said.
Set SMART goals
Schrick recommends setting SMART goals: those that are specific, measurable, attainable, relevant and urgent.
- Specific and measurable: “Your goal can’t just be something like, ‘I need to be healthier,'” Schrick said. “It’s not particularly useful.” But if you narrow it down to “I want to eat more vegetables, so I’ll try to eat them at two meals a day,” then it’s concise enough that you can easily follow along.
- Feasible: Schrick said people should set goals that are neither ambitious nor unrealistic. “This has to be something that can actually be achieved,” Schrick said. “If you’ve never run in your life, but you say, ‘This summer I’m going to run a marathon,’ you might be able to do it, but you’re probably setting yourself up for failure.
Butyou’re more likely to participate in a 5K race by summer. - Relevant: Finding true motivation that makes sense in one’s own life and desires is important for progressing toward a goal. “It has to be something you actually want to achieve,” Schrick said. “There has to be a motivator that goes beyond ‘I want to look better in a swimsuit by summer’ or ‘My mom told me I need to be healthier.’ It should be something personally relevant to you.
- Time sensitive: The goal should have a built-in end point or deadline, where it is achieved or not. “Your goal can be to achieve it every day,” Schrick said. “It doesn’t have to be something far in the future. If your goal is to eat two servings of vegetables every day, but you don’t get there one day, that doesn’t mean you should stop. You can just try again tomorrow.
Thinking outside the body
Although physical health tends to be the focus of many New Year’s resolutions, Schrick said it’s helpful to consider other types of changes that can benefit mental and emotional health.
“While improving our physical health is a worthy goal, most of the time what ends up happening is that we give up on them when we don’t see results as quickly as we should,” said Schrick.
Setting a goal to read more books, make more of an effort to reach out to friends, or spend more time outdoors are all changes that can feel good from the inside out.
“I also like the idea of changing our mindset about things,” Schrick said. “Deciding to be kinder to yourself or speaking more kindly to yourself in your head can go a long way. Try to catch your negative thoughts before they become mean to yourself.
“Just grabbing and reframing some of these words can have a huge impact, the benefits of which you may not notice until it becomes useful to you,” she said. “It might take you months of practicing this before you notice, ‘Oh wow, my first thought wasn’t bad this time.’ This can be a very useful thing to do.
Deciding to tidy your living space more regularly can also have a big impact on mental health, and Schrick said it’s a good practice for forming a new habit in general. It’s also a useful goal to set as a family, and can be tracked using a task chart or other visual indicators of progress.
“Talk with your kids about how you all share this space, so you can share the work it takes to keep your space clean,” Schrick said. “Maybe you have a common motivation to finish it. “If we can keep the house tidy and cross off all our goals this week, then we can order pizza Friday night” – whatever works for your family.
“Just having those shared goals and that visual tracking helps you hold each other accountable for making sure things get done,” Schrick said.
For more information and resources on family life, visit the Cooperative Extension Service website. Personal and family well-being page.