Every year I make New Year’s resolutions to make a new habit of exercising more, improving my diet or stopping smoking, but my good intentions fall by the wayside within weeks. How can I make this year different?
If it makes you feel better, you’re hardly alone with this experience. New Year’s resolutions are easy to make — and easy to break. A 2024 survey by the Pew Research Center found that less than a month into the new year, only 59% of people who made multiple resolutions had kept all of them. After that, the stick-to-it rate typically slides even more.
“People need to recognize that motivation goes up and down over time — it’s a motivation wave,” says BJ Fogg, a behavior change expert at Stanford Lifestyle Medicine and author of the book “Tiny Habits: The Small Changes That Change Everything.” “Something you’re motivated to do at the beginning of the year, you may not be motivated to do at the end of January.”
People often want to know how long it takes to make a new habit stick. But there isn’t a magic number.
“There’s wide variation across people and the complexity of the action — habits can take months to form and become stable,” says Katy Milkman, a behavioral scientist at the Wharton School at the University of Pennsylvania and author of the book “How to Change: The Science of Getting From Where You Are to Where You Want to Be.”
Fortunately, you can take key steps to help yourself stick with your resolutions over time. Here’s how:
[See: Food Psychology: Understanding Eating Behaviors and Habits]
1. Question your motives
“Think clearly about what you want and question your assumptions about what you think you want to do and why,” Fogg advises.
If you’re going to change your behavior in a sustainable fashion, you’ll want to do it for your own meaningful reasons. For example, if you realize you want to improve your eating habits so you’ll have more energy or reduce your blood pressure, you’ll have a personally valuable reason for doing it.
[See: Mind-Blowing Benefits of Exercise.]
2. Create a clear and specific resolution
Having a vague or abstract goal can impair your ability to successfully change a habit. On the other hand, if you break a big goal — such as “I want to get in shape“ — into bite-sized, actionable steps — such as “I’ll go to the gym for 30 minutes, three times per week” — you’ll have a road map for pursuing your resolution.
“If you’re going to stick to a resolution, you need to make it either really flexible or really simple,” Fogg says. “Specificity changes behavior because then you can design for it.”
To do this, tie your resolution to a set of actions you can take on a daily or weekly basis, including when and where you’ll do it.
“As soon as you get into the details, you improve your chances of following through,” Milkman says.
It’s also a good idea to frame the resolution positively. Research has found that people who set approach-oriented goals (“I will do X”) for their New Year’s resolutions are more successful than those who set avoidance-oriented goals (such as “I won’t do Y”).
[READ: Top Healthy Habits for Weight Loss, According to Dietitians]
3. Make the resolution easy to do
“What makes a change stick is forming habits that you can do relatively automatically without struggling or having to think about it,” says Wendy Wood, professor emerita of psychology and business at the University of Southern California and author of the book “Good Habits, Bad Habits: The Science of Making Positive Changes That Stick.” “People are more likely to repeat behaviors when the behavior is relatively easy.”
If you want to improve your eating habits, purge your kitchen of highly processed foods and stock up on fresh fruits, vegetables, whole grains, nuts, seeds and sources of lean protein. That way, you can set yourself up to eat healthfully easily. Or you could pack your workout bag with fresh exercise clothes and put it in the car for tomorrow’s trip to the gym.
“Habit formation is as much a function of the environment as the behavior itself,” Wood says.
[READ: How to Build Healthy Habits for the Family]
4. Help yourself feel successful
Look for markers of success to help you feel motivated to continue doing what you’re doing.
“The reason that matters so much is the feeling of success wires the habit,” Fogg says. “Emotions create habits. A habit gets wired into the brain when there’s a really strong emotion. Don’t leave the emotion to chance. Deliberately help yourself feel successful so your brain makes that connection.”
For example, after walking several times per week for a few weeks, you might take note that you can walk faster or for longer without getting fatigued, or you’re sleeping better. Pause to appreciate the improvement(s) and give yourself a mental high-five.
5. Make the pursuit enjoyable
You could do this by exercising with a friend or listening to a great podcast while preparing healthy meals. Or, you could use a strategy called “temptation bundling,” which lets you engage in a guilty pleasure only while you’re doing a valued activity you want to make a habit.
“Find something you really enjoy and bundle it with a change you’re trying to make,” Milkman explains.
For example, you might let yourself binge-watch your favorite show only while you’re on the treadmill. Creating a built-in reward for the activity you aspire to make a habit can even help you overcome procrastination, laziness and other obstacles, Milkman says.
6. Be patient with yourself
Remember that slipups are common, so don’t beat yourself up if or when you have one. Instead, simply focus on getting back on track.
“One of the keys to improving your life is to keep going,” Fogg says. “You don’t have to be perfect. It’s a process. If you fall down, get up and keep going.”
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