When was the last time you set a New Year’s resolution and successfully achieved it? If you have found it difficult to follow through with goals you have set for yourself in the past, you are not alone. Quite often, people have ideas for ways they would like to improve their lives, but they don’t actually know how to establish goals in a way that is likely to result in the desired outcome. Ensuring that you establish SMART goals heading into 2025 will make it easier to get what you want. At Highland Hospital Behavioral Health in Charleston, West Virginia, we provide our patients with the tools to set and achieve goals that improve their quality of life.
Why Resolutions Fail
A 2023 poll of Americans found that some of the top resolutions they planned to set included:
- Saving more money
- Exercising more
- Eating healthier
- Spending more time with loved ones
- Losing weight
- Reducing spending
While these are valid concepts that could very well make a person’s life better, they aren’t written in a way that ensures success. How will you know if you have eaten healthier? In what ways will you reduce spending? Why is it important to exercise more? Answering these and other questions can help you to accomplish what you wish to achieve.
What are SMART Goals?
A SMART goal requires careful thought and planning, which makes it easier to determine exactly what you want and why. These aspirations must be:
- Specific – What exactly do you want to do? Who will be involved? If you want to exercise more, what will that look like? Are you going to walk around a track, go to a gym and lift weights, or swim at the pool? Are you going first thing in the morning, during lunch, or after work? What will you do to ensure that you follow through, such as packing a gym bag the night before or checking in with a friend about your progress?
- Measurable – How much change are you trying to make? How will you know that you are meeting your goal? How many times per week will you work out? How much time will you spend working out? Are you trying to run a certain distance within a specified time frame?
- Actionable/Achievable – Is your goal realistic? Can you do what you aspire to do in the timeframe you have set? Have you considered what factors could be outside your control and what additional resources you might need, such as new running shoes or a gym membership? If you’re hoping to run a marathon, you’ll need more time to train than if you want to run a 5K.
- Relevant – Why are you setting this goal? What is the reason behind your action? Will it improve your health, make you happier, or strengthen your relationships?
- Time-bound – When will you be done with this goal? Do you need to set incremental goals along the way, to ensure that you’re staying on track for success? For example, if your long-term goal is to run a marathon in one year, do you need to sign up for some shorter races in the interim?
After you have considered all of these questions, your goal to “exercise more” might look more like, “I will run in ten 5K races by the end of the year. I will go online this weekend to find 5Ks I can sign up for now and ask friends who have participated in 5Ks previously for suggestions. To train, I will follow the Mayo Clinic suggested schedule to train for a 5K. On days when the weather isn’t good for walking or running outside, I will use a treadmill at the gym. I will exercise after I get off work each day. I will pack a gym bag each night so that I have clothes, earbuds, and shoes ready to go when I leave for work in the morning. I will hold myself accountable by having a weekly conversation with my sister, who also runs 5Ks.”
Additional Tips for Ensuring Success
Once you know what you want to do, how, when, where, and why, you can take additional steps to increase your likelihood of achieving your goal:
- Start small. A good goal requires you to push yourself a bit, but if it is too big, you might become discouraged and give up. Focus on moving in the right direction initially, allowing yourself to gain momentum.
- Write it down. This can mean putting a post-it note on your bathroom mirror, hanging a reminder on the fridge, or setting a reminder in your phone. Whatever you choose, make sure it is something you will see every day.
- Go public. Talking to other people about your goal will make it more real and add accountability.
- Stack habits. When you want to form a new habit, attach it to something else you already do regularly. For example, if you want to make it a weekly habit to contact your mom, plan to call her immediately before or after something you already do every week, like going to the laundromat or attending church.
- Use an app. There are goal-setting apps you can use to help you maintain focus and motivation.
- Celebrate small successes. Although your goal may not be complete for a month, a year, or even longer, give yourself recognition for the progress you are making along the way by setting smaller, incremental goals and rewarding yourself for achieving them.
At Highland Hospital Behavioral Health, we take a whole-person approach to behavioral health treatment that utilizes not only therapy and medication, but also exercise, nutrition, community connection, and other evidence-based approaches according to the individual needs and goals of our patients.
