Remember when you promised to dedicate at least three hours daily to your studies at the start of the year? Or when 2021 began, and you promised to reduce your soda intake to twice monthly instead of your usual daily consumption? Yeah, we’ve all been there, where the excitement of the new year is boring down on us, and everyone scrambling to set goals for the new year sometimes pushes us to make plans of our own. Here’s the thing though, resolutions are simple to make but hard to keep. They need dedication and consistency to pull through.

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With the dawn of a new year and new resolutions, there are some tips you can use to help you stick to your years’ resolutions and turn them into a habit. First, do it a day at a time and set daily goals.  Developing habits don’t happen instantly. It takes time and effort. Therefore, consistency and discipline play a key role in skill development and developing healthy habits. Say your goal is to read two books each month and improve your vocabulary. When you’re not an avid reader, scrambling to read one book a day will be hard to maintain. Start small, and build it up from there. The best way to achieve this would be to set aside time to read certain pages each day. When you do this consistently, you will find yourself picking up more books and smashing that target.

Next, get an accountability partner.  Tell someone and make them your accountability partner. When you’re trying to develop a new habit, telling someone you trust and asking them to make you accountable for your goals goes a long way. Also, track, track, track. Track your progress. Reward small wins—know slacks. Track everything. When you track, every little win pushes you a little more to achieve a set goal when you keep track. So when tracking progress, try to reward and celebrate your small victories.
Lastly, set reminders. Each day comes with its set of challenges and may cause us to forget doing something at a said time. Set reminders daily to prevent slacking on new habits and maintain consistency.