2023 - The Year I…
What do you hope 2023 will bring for you? What are your hopes and dreams for the next twelve months? Are you someone who sets resolutions for the New Year?
For more years than I can count, I have written down my New Year's resolutions. They have almost always been the same goals: lose weight, go to the gym, eat healthier, walk more, meditate, journal, etc. My goals were almost always self-care goals—and unfortunately, they were the things I often just didn't want to do. So, year after year I would come up short on my New Year’s resolutions.
As I have gotten older, wiser, and become more self-aware, I realize I suffer from an ailment I’ll call "You're not the boss of me." I suffer from a severe resistance to others—anyone really— telling me what to do. Unfortunately, the resistance also extends to me; I resist me telling me what to do. So, after years of trying and failing, I’ve learned that my usual New Year's resolutions are never going to work well for me.
Now, I’ve learned to think in a broader sense. When I evaluate my past year and think about the upcoming one, and knowing my own resistance to self-care goals, I am more focused on setting goals that will make me happier.
So this year, instead of "walk more," I have set the goal of getting a dog. Having a dog in my life just makes me infinitely happier—and an inevitable outcome of owning a dog is that I will walk more.
I’ve also learned some techniques for making behavioral changes. If I really want to achieve a new goal, my best chance at success is to think about setting implementation intentions in order to achieve that goal.
An implementation intention specifies the what, when, and where, and is written in an “if-then” format. “If it’s six o’clock and a weekday morning, then I will get up, get a cup of coffee, and sit at my desk and write for an hour.”
As Marelisa Fabrega shares in her article here, “There are two different aspects you need to consider when setting implementation intentions.”
Identify the action that you’re going to take to achieve your goal, and how you’ll know when to take it.
Identify possible obstacles to goal-achievement, and how you’ll deal with them.
First, identify the goal-directed behavior that you want to take, and the situational cue that will let you know that it’s time to implement said behavior. For example, suppose that your goal is to lose weight. You could decide that you’re going to start by taking forty-minute walks.
Second, identify the obstacles that could push you off track and interfere with your goal follow-through. Once you’ve identified these obstacles, you create an if-then statement to deal with each one. For example:
Goal: Make progress on writing my novel.
Implementation intention: I will better use down time–for example, if I find myself with time while waiting for the doctor to see me, or waiting for new tires to be put on my car—then I will review my notes and work on my novel. “
Whatever goals you choose to work on in 2023, I hope you find yourself writing more and sharing that writing with others.
If you’d like to share your experience and advice for achieving writing goals, please send me an email at emily@boldstorypress.com and we’ll find a way to share that advice with other writers.
I wish you a successful and happy 2023!
Best,
Emily