{"id":1511,"date":"2008-12-29T10:00:00","date_gmt":"2008-12-29T10:00:00","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/blog.beliefnet.com\/beyondblue\/2008\/12\/gretchen-rubin-12-tips-to-stic.html"},"modified":"2008-12-29T10:00:00","modified_gmt":"2008-12-29T10:00:00","slug":"gretchen-rubin-12-tips-to-stic","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.beliefnet.com\/columnists\/beyondblue\/2008\/12\/gretchen-rubin-12-tips-to-stic.html","title":{"rendered":"Gretchen Rubin: 12 Tips to Stick to Your New Year&#8217;s Resolutions"},"content":{"rendered":"<p>I also liked Gretchen Rubin&#8217;s tips on how to stick to your new year&#8217;s resolutions. Here they are.<\/p>\n<blockquote><p>It&#8217;s almost New Year&#8217;s Eve, and that means it&#8217;s the season for resolutions. I&#8217;ve always been part of the 44% of Americans who make (and also break) New Year&#8217;s resolutions; I&#8217;m a big believer in the power of small changes to make us happier.<\/p>\n<p>Along the way, and especially since I started my resolutions-based happiness project, I&#8217;ve hit on some strategies for helping myself stick to resolutions.<\/p>\n<p><span class=\"Apple-style-span\" style=\"font-weight: bold\">1. Be specific.<\/span> Don&#8217;t resolve to &#8220;Make more friends&#8221; or &#8220;Strengthen friendships&#8221;; that&#8217;s too vague. To make more friends as part of my happiness project, I have several very concrete resolutions like: &#8220;Start a group,&#8221; &#8220;Remember birthdays,&#8221; &#8220;Say hello,&#8221; &#8220;Make plans,&#8221; &#8220;Show up,&#8221; and &#8220;No gossip.&#8221;<\/p>\n<p><span class=\"Apple-style-span\" style=\"font-weight: bold\">2. Write it down.<\/span><\/p>\n<p><span class=\"Apple-style-span\" style=\"font-weight: bold\">3. Review your resolution constantly.<\/span> If your resolution is buzzing through your head, it&#8217;s easier to stick to it. I review my Resolutions Chart every night.<\/p>\n<p><span class=\"Apple-style-span\" style=\"font-weight: bold\">4. Hold yourself accountable.<\/span> Tell other people about your resolution, join or form a like-minded group, score yourself on a chart (my method) &#8212; whatever works for you to make yourself feel accountable for success and failure.<\/p>\n<p><span class=\"Apple-style-span\" style=\"font-weight: bold\">5. Think big.<\/span> Maybe you need a big change, a big adventure &#8211; a trip to a foreign place, a break-up, a move, a new job. Let yourself imagine anything, and plan from there.<\/p>\n<p><span class=\"Apple-style-span\" style=\"font-weight: bold\">6. Think small<\/span>. Don&#8217;t fall into the trap of thinking that only radical change can make a difference. Just keeping your fridge cleared out could give you a real boost. Look close to home for ways to improve and grow.\n<\/p>\n<\/blockquote>\n<p>\n<a href=\"http:\/\/www.happiness-project.com\/happiness_project\/2008\/12\/how-to-stick-to.html\">Get to the next tip by clicking here.<\/a><\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"<p>I also liked Gretchen Rubin&#8217;s tips on how to stick to your new year&#8217;s resolutions. Here they are. It&#8217;s almost New Year&#8217;s Eve, and that means it&#8217;s the season for resolutions. I&#8217;ve always been part of the 44% of Americans who make (and also break) New Year&#8217;s resolutions; I&#8217;m a big believer in the power&hellip;<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":17,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"closed","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[6],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-1511","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-mental-health"],"yoast_head":"<!-- This site is optimized with the Yoast SEO plugin v23.9 - https:\/\/yoast.com\/wordpress\/plugins\/seo\/ -->\n<title>Gretchen Rubin: 12 Tips to Stick to Your New Year&#039;s Resolutions - Beyond Blue<\/title>\n<meta name=\"robots\" content=\"index, follow, max-snippet:-1, max-image-preview:large, max-video-preview:-1\" \/>\n<link rel=\"canonical\" href=\"https:\/\/www.beliefnet.com\/columnists\/beyondblue\/2008\/12\/gretchen-rubin-12-tips-to-stic.html\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:locale\" content=\"en_US\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:type\" content=\"article\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:title\" content=\"Gretchen Rubin: 12 Tips to Stick to Your New Year&#039;s Resolutions - Beyond Blue\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:description\" content=\"I also liked Gretchen Rubin&#8217;s tips on how to stick to your new year&#8217;s resolutions. 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Borchard writes the daily blog, Beyond Blue, on Beliefnet.com. She is the author of Beyond Blue: Surviving Depression &amp; Anxiety and Making the Most of Bad Genes and The Pocket Therapist. You may find her at her personal blog, her website, or you may follow her on Twitter @thereseborchard.","sameAs":["http:\/\/thereseborchard.com"],"url":"https:\/\/www.beliefnet.com\/columnists\/beyondblue\/author\/tborchard"}]}},"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.beliefnet.com\/columnists\/beyondblue\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/1511","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.beliefnet.com\/columnists\/beyondblue\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.beliefnet.com\/columnists\/beyondblue\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.beliefnet.com\/columnists\/beyondblue\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/17"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.beliefnet.com\/columnists\/beyondblue\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=1511"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.beliefnet.com\/columnists\/beyondblue\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/1511\/revisions"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.beliefnet.com\/columnists\/beyondblue\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=1511"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.beliefnet.com\/columnists\/beyondblue\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=1511"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.beliefnet.com\/columnists\/beyondblue\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=1511"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}