New Year, New Me?

 "I'll have a lemonade; I'm doing Dry January."

"I can't meet today; I'm off to the gym, trying to get fit as my New Year's resolution."

"Can't eat that; I'm doing Veganuary."

I think I speak for... well, myself, when I say to these types of people: I DON'T CARE! Well done, you’ve made a little promise to yourself, which will no doubt lead to a miserable January and be forgotten about by February.

I think most people can see the appeal of trying to make a big change at the start of a new year. I’ve been guilty of it myself and still am, to a certain extent. But the biggest issue is that people’s goals are too big. If you think about what the last week of December looks like for the majority of Brits—with bubbly for breakfast, chocolate for lunch, a kilo of Blackstick Blue for dinner, and the only exercise being a 20-minute walk after Christmas lunch to "burn off the turkey"—then expect not only to go back to the diet and activity levels of pre-December 24th but to completely change your lifestyle... Never gonna happen.

In my job, we talk about SMART objectives a lot. SMART stands for Specific, Measurable, Achievable, Realistic, and Time-bound. All targets, goals, objectives, and resolutions should be SMART. Many New Year’s resolutions are not SMART. For starters, most aren’t achievable.

I do have a few "resolutions" this year, but they are not unrealistic. One is to walk more, to get more steps in each day. Is this SMART? Well, the way I’ve done it, YES!

Last year, my phone told me I achieved an average of 7,170 steps a day. Clearly, I’m not the most active person, but hey, it’s something to work on. Initially, I thought, "Let’s do 10,000 steps a day." I generally achieved over 10,000 steps only a couple of times a month last year. As a goal, 10,000 is not realistic. What is realistic? 8,000. So that’s my goal—an average of 8,000 per day for the year.

If I achieve that, I should be a bit healthier by 2026. The great thing about this is if I only do 10 steps tomorrow, it’s not the end of the world and not the end of the resolution. I can make up for the odd day over the course of a year.

If I were stopping drinking and had a beer, that would be it—I’d have failed. Failure isn’t fun, so why set myself up for it? That’s why I’m making realistic targets that won’t be lost by January 7th. That wouldn’t be good for my mental health