Creating a System of Success for your New Year Resolutions

I see a lot of people making extreme New Year Resolutions that set themselves up for failure. A resolution is worthless without a good plan and a plan might never be followed through without a system that makes it easy to succeed. With weight loss, it's often tied to cutting fast food and eating out so let's use that as an example. This is focused on the money associated with it but you could easily sub in calories or whatever other metric you'd like to use.

Let’s say my New Year’s Resolution is to spend less than $100 a month eating out for a family of two. That’s a SMART goal, it’s specific, measurable, seems attainable, relevant, and time based. A plan to achieve that goal might be to cook the majority of meals at home and maybe only eat out two-five times a month, depending on the price of the restaurant. If that plan were executed perfectly, then it would work!

But, it doesn’t necessarily make it easy to succeed. Life gets in the way and we end up swinging through the drive thru, picking up a pizza, or getting delivery. With a cheap average of $20 per eating out (for two), that means we reach our budget after just 5 meals. If we have 3 meals a day for 30 days that’s 90 meals total. At 94% perfect, we reach our budget and anything less than that we go over the budget. Effectively, we’ve given ourselves a 6% chance at success.

A system of success is designed to give us a better chance at reaching our goals. The first plan had no baseline, expected the changes right away, and left us with a 6% chance of success. So, if the goal is to eventually spend less than $100 a month eating out for a family of two, let’s reevaluate our timeline.

Under the new system, we first determine our baseline. Our baseline is how much we are actually spending a month on eating out, we’ll say we’re currently spending $400 a month. Then, we gradually reduce that number until we achieve our goal. Our new goal might be to reduce our spending on eating out by $100 a month for three months and then maintain the $100 a month eating out budget.

To put this into numbers, that means we’re eating out for roughly 20 meals at the beginning and we want to reduce it to 5 meals eating out after three months. So our goal is 15 meals eating out for the first month, 10 meals eating out for the second month, and 5 meals eating out for the third month. Just with our new baseline and goal structure, our chance of success becomes 75% for the first month (20 to 15), ~67% in the second month (15 to 10), and 50% in the third month (10 to 5).

Now, we add behaviors that make it easy to cook at home. A list of possible options are below.

· Plan and shop for groceries on Saturday

· Buy ingredients that can lend themselves to different flavors so you can satisfy cravings (bell peppers, onions, tomatoes, rice, etc. make it easy to make Asian, Mexican, Italian, Cajun, etc.)

· Meal prep weekday lunches on Sunday

· Spend one weekend a month making a big batch of easy food that can be frozen and easily reheated (empanadas and tamales are great!)

· Keep the kitchen clean

Then, we plan for failure. A few examples are below.

· Keep nonperishable snacks in your car so you’re not tempted by the drive thru

· Have a couple emergency meals at home and the office (i.e. canned soup, ramen, frozen burritos, etc.)

· Determine which fast food options are the cheapest/healthiest

· Are there coupons available that can make your budget go farther? That way, even if you have 20 meals you may still be reducing your spending which is the main goal.

At the end of each month, review your system and adjust as needed. A few possible modifications are below.

· Find free weekly meal plans online so you don’t have to plan

· Add grocery shopping to your calendar with an alert reminder

· Create simple one pot, one sheet pan, or stock pot meals for big batches and easy clean up

· Are healthy ready made meals from grocery stores included in the grocery budget or eating out budget?

By shifting our focus, setting realistic goals, and outlining behaviors that will help us reach our goals we can make it easier to achieve our New Year Resolutions. So to all of you who want to work out every day, eat 1200 calories, cut eating out completely, etc. take the time now to set yourself up for success. I guarantee you'll reach your goals faster and easier if you take the time to create a system of success rather than jumping in and giving up when it's overwhelming.

submitted by /u/GoldenR22
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