A Better Way to Set New Year’s Resolutions

Why Resolutions Fail

Every December, we attempt the same ritual.

We sit down, stare at a blank page, and tell ourselves this is the year we become a combination of a monk, an elite athlete, and a Fortune 500 CEO.

Classic New Year planning usually looks like this:

1. Sit hunched over a laptop

2. Write a heroic list of SMART goals

3. Forget 80% of them by February

The problem isn’t that your goals are bad. The problem is that most planning ignores a few inconvenient realities:

• You’re already fried, physically and mentally

• You skip reflection and jump straight to goals

• You plan as if life won’t interfere

If you’re looking for something different, here’s the framework I use every year. You can dial it up or down depending on how much energy you have.

Step 1 - Relaxxxxx

If your shoulders are creeping toward your ears from stress, you are not going to produce meaningful insight.

Your body dictates the quality of your thinking. When your nervous system is dialed up, your goals will be too. That’s how we end up with wild overcorrections like, “This is the year I wake up at 4 a.m. and meditate for ninety minutes.”

Before you touch a notebook, give yourself a downshift ritual. This can be as grand as a wellness retreat or as simple as a day without your phone.

Some ideas:

Body or sensory reset

• Sauna, steam room, or very hot shower

• Massage or spa equivalent

• Light yoga class

• Acupuncture, float tank, cupping

Mind relaxation

• Pranayama or meditation

• Morning coffee in a new cafe without your phone

• A long walk in nature

• A workout followed by sitting in a park, phone-free

The key is novelty. Do this somewhere outside your normal routine. If you follow your usual patterns, you’ll end up in the same mental and physical state you’re always in.

Once your body softens, your mind follows. Then the planning can begin.

Step 2 - Brain Dump and Reflect

This stage isn’t about sounding impressive. It’s about emptying the mental junk drawer so you can actually see what’s inside.

Write fast. No editing. No evaluation. Let your mind wander and dump everything out.

Some prompts to try:

Values

• What words describe last year

• What did the year reveal about my values

• Which values stayed the same, and which shifted

Change

• How have I changed

• What good habits formed

• What bad habits crept in

• How did I grow intellectually

• How did I change emotionally

• How did my health shift

• How did I evolve spiritually

Happiness

• What brought me joy

• When was I fully alive

• What did I love doing

• What did I hate doing

Struggles

• What drained me

• What disappointed me

• When was I bored

Identity

• What makes me special

• What do people like about me

• What do people dislike or misunderstand

Experiences

• Which moments were the most joyful

• Which were the most challenging

• Which were the most transformative

Dreams

• Who do I want to be in one year when it comes to:

  • Health

  • Fitness

  • Intellectual growth

  • Character

  • Spirituality

  • Social life

  • Love

  • Finances

  • Work

• If I had unlimited money, what would I do

• If I had unlimited time, what would I do

• What does successful work and life look like

After you finish, review your notes.

You’ll start to notice patterns. What actually nourishes you, which habits quietly erode your happiness, which environments make you feel alive.

Those patterns are the raw ingredients for the next phase.

Step 3 - Choose a theme, not 47 SMART goals

This is where most people break their own planning.

They set goals that only make sense to the version of themselves who wrote them on January 1.

Instead, choose a theme. Think direction, not contract.

A theme can be:

• A single word

• A phrase

• A mantra

A good theme does a few things well:

• It reflects who you already are and who you want to become

• It holds up when circumstances change

• It guides decision making

• It helps you prioritize

• It recenters you during stress or times of ambiguity

Here are some of my past themes and how they showed up in real life:

Theme: Create more, consume less

• Thirty minutes of creativity every day

• Choosing to write instead of watch TV

• Planning things to do instead of just joining other people’s plans

• At work, more hands-on creation instead of just reviewing others’ work

• Ship small things imperfectly instead of waiting to polish

Theme: You have everything you need. Just breathe

• Focus on exercise that emphasizes breath: meditation, yoga, aerobic workouts

• A daily gratitude habit

• Solo adventures to museums, movies, shows

Theme: Build community by deepening existing relationships

• Traveling less to see the same people more often

• Weekly rituals or standing hangouts

• Becoming a regular somewhere

• Choosing consistency over novelty in people, places, and routines

Step 4 - Plan Quick Wins

Now make it practical.

Using your theme, look for easy momentum builders:

• What can you start doing tomorrow that aligns with your theme?

• What can you remove from your life?

• What new or old habits support your theme?

This isn’t about perfection. It’s about traction. Let the theme do the heavy lifting.

Step 5 - Share with Others

Reflection done in isolation has a short half-life.

Share your theme with:

• Close friends

• A partner

• One or two people who intimidate you in a healthy way

• A mentor

As part of this process, I also like to give thanks to those people for the previous year. Write a note, send a text, or have a conversation.

Fun Extra Credit

New Year’s resolutions are always so serious and focused on improving yourself, which is why I’ve started picking up a vice every year.

This year, mine was to smoke twelve cigarettes. It aligned with my theme of deepening existing relationships. It’s social, memorable, and won’t derail the rest of my life. Plus, why not.

In case you’re wondering, I’m at 1.25 cigarettes so far. The holidays are about to be busy.