New Year’s resolutions: the promises we make ourselves for change in the coming calendar year. Everybody does it. And everybody breaks these promises, because we all know that New Year’s resolutions are conditional: I will do these things, if I have the time and money and motivation and… But there is something better than resolutions.

Real change doesn’t come from trying harder—it comes from living a different story.

Why New Year’s Resolutions Fail (and Always Have)

Allow me to spare you the lengthy, detailed psychological analysis and instead offer you a simple observation that will tell you everything you need to know:

Go to your local gym (if you have several options, just pick one) in January. Note the mean density of resolvers-per-machine (i.e. the number of well-meaning folks dedicated to actualizing their resolutions). Observe the number of cars in the parking lot, the wait time for the treadmills, the length of the line for the glute machine of your choice. Write numerical values for the data you gather.

Next, repeat this observational/correlational study in March. Compare the numbers at the beginning and the end of that 90-day span.

Invariably, your quasi-scientific analysis will reveal a predictable, replicable, and significant statistical result: time after January 1 is inversely related to gym attendance.

Many—if not most—of the people who resolved to “get in shape” (the most common New Year’s resolution, followed by promises to increase financial health) at the end of December are gone by March.

So it goes with resolutions; we laugh at our expected failure to commit and explain that we were just a little too optimistic, and way too busy.

That’s all you need to know about the ultimate fate of the promises we make to ourselves at the end of the year.

The Real Reason We Fail at Change Isn’t Time or Motivation

What happened? We really do want to eat better, exercise more, sleep more soundly, save some money.

The line, as I have said before, of people who don’t want more money and better health is one of the shortest lines in existence.

And yes, we blame it on circumstances beyond our control (too busy, too broke, etc.), but I will posit a more powerful reason beneath the situational excuses.

The missing piece is not time nor money, but something deeper, a factor foundational to all the rest. In psychological terms, this is a failure of identity and narrative coherence.

What we lack is a vision.

Resolutions, by themselves, are incidental. We view them as individual tasks to be added to our already busy lives. Seen in this way, the changes we want to make aren’t strong enough to stand alone against all the other pressures of daily life.

But include those individual resolutions as parts of a larger, coherent vision, and you change the perspective.

Vision Beats Willpower: The Missing Piece Behind Lasting Change

Instead of making resolutions, envision the totality of your life for the next year.

Write this story down. Not just your resolutions, but your entire existence, in the real world.

First, picture your life as it is now, from your alarm going off, to breakfast and your commute. Think about your job and your relationships. Picture the way you spend your free time (honestly, please - no one has to read this but you), and how much free time you have. Where do you live? With whom do you spend time and more importantly, who do you want to spend time with?

Make your story as real as possible, rich in detail and accurate in measure.

Then, instead of adding “resolutions” as yet more tasks to accomplish, write one more little story, just for yourself:

What would you need to do to boost your happiness, satisfaction, and well-being? What would improve your sense of self-esteem and accomplishment?  What actions would allow you to be more confident—more competent?

What would make you feel more comfortable and safe?

In short, write your vision of what your ideal (or at least better) life would look like.

How to Create a Happy New Year (Without Resolutions)

Once you can see the life you want as one coherent story, your resolutions—made in the New Year or otherwise—are not stand-alone chores to be done, but actions you automatically take as part of the new and better life you are now already living.

You are no longer trying to fit some gym time into your schedule, or adding 10,000 steps—somehow—into your standard routine.

Your new life simply includes moving your body every day; a part of your routine, like brushing your teeth or eating lunch.

The beautiful result of this mindset change is that the other individual things on your resolutions list simply happen: you lose the weight and regulate your blood pressure and trash your CPAP machine and look better and your knees stop hurting and you are no longer short of breath just walking to your mailbox.

Not as a bunch of separate chores, but as automatic benefits gained from your new daily life habits.

How you make the change is entirely up to you. Walk in the morning before work? Stop at the gym and lift weights on the way home? Attend your 6 PM yoga class instead of bingeing Netflix?

And so it goes with every aspect of your life that you want to improve, not just physical health.

Look at the story of your new and better life you wrote earlier. Be bold: settle for nothing less than better health, financial stability, happiness and security, and whatever else you envisioned.

And ensure Peace of Mind, at all costs.

Identity-Based Habits: How New Lives Create New Behaviors

The trick—as always—lies in mindset. These new actions are not separate chores to be added “in the new year,” but simply the way you live your life now.

Just make the decision that your new life is worth the actions you identified. Then do them every day, without fail. A new routine that is a new and better life.

You don’t need to wait. You don’t need anyone’s permission. Start now. 

Happiness follows meaning—not the other way around.

Write your new story.

Live your new actions.

Create Your World.




- JWW

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