Why Your New Year’s Resolutions Need ‘Cues,’ According to Science

Thanks to my spinning classes, I have a front-row seat to a reliable annual phenomenon: my classes are packed during the first few weeks of the year while people are making their New Year’s resolutions, but by mid-February I’m back teaching normal-sized groups who are grateful that the “January attendees” are gone. But I’m always sad to see new faces leave, because I TO DO I think it’s possible to set a New Year’s resolution and stick to it, even if it’s not the norm.

There are many personal development goals you can set for yourself as the new year approaches, both in and out of the gym, but no matter what you strive to do, it’s important to have an implementation strategy that ensures you actually achieve it. One way to better set yourself up for success is to attach “clues” to your resolutions. Here’s why it works and how to do it.

How to Tie Your New Year’s Resolutions to Signals

The more specific your goals are, the better their results will be. This is true for just about everything, which is why I recommend SMART goals for everything from studying to developing your personal productivity roadmap. For those unfamiliar, a SMART goal is a well-defined goal that includes specific, measurable, achievable, realistic, and time-bound items, such as: “I will prepare four meals a week every week for the first three months of the year, then determine if I have the capacity to add more or if I should stick to four.” » You can already see how this is better than “I’m going to start meal prepping this year” – but SMART goals are just one option and we have other things to explore.

If you wake up on a Saturday morning and want to clean your living space, you’ll have more success identifying a room you want to clean than just trying to “clean the house”, right? When it comes to New Year’s resolutions, this specificity is important, since you’re planning 12 months of change and will need some sort of roadmap. Instead of saying your resolution is to “eat healthier,” you should define what’s missing from your diet and then dig deeper: “I want to eat 10 more grams of protein every day,” for example.

This is where the clues will become valuable. Research shows that adding a cue (literally an action trigger) to your goals can help you better implement them. On a smaller scale, I’ve recommended this type of approach through something called “habit stacking,” which you can do when you pair a habit you want to develop (like responding to all your pending emails each day) with a habit you already have (like making and drinking your morning coffee). You adopt the new habit while picking up the old one, and over time the new habit takes root as well.

We rely on automatic processes to carry out standard tasks in our daily lives, like the way we automatically turn on the coffee maker after waking up or collect the keys on the way out the door. In these cases, waking up and walking out the door are actually signals to our brain that it’s time to complete the second half of the process. Building your resolutions around cues will also help them become second-nature habits. Here are some examples:

• If your New Year’s resolution is to save a certain amount of money by December, say something like, “When I spend $X, I will save $Y.”

• If you want to be more productive at work, try turning the Pomodoro technique into a resolution: “When I work for 25 minutes, I take a five-minute break.

• “When I sit at my desk, I respond to all new emails.”

• “When my meetings are over, I will take five minutes to meditate.”

• “After work is done, I put on my sneakers and head straight to the gym.”

• “When the 6 p.m. news is over, I’ll call my mother.”

By doing it this way, you combine the specificity needed to set realistic goals with the proven method of habit stacking, setting yourself up for more success than a vague desire to “work out more” or “call home more.”

Why Signals Work for New Year’s Resolutions

There are several reasons why tying your resolutions to existing signals will help you stick to them. First, you create these automatic processes in your brain, essentially tricking your subconscious into taking action whenever your trigger occurs. It will take a few weeks of conscious effort, yes, but you will already know that When you’re supposed to act on your new habit, which is half the battle.

Operating this way also leaves less room for error. If you don’t have a set schedule and metrics in place, you can easily forget to do your new task, or maybe even actively avoid it. Putting reminders in your calendar can also be helpful, as the push alert can further emphasize that it’s time to get down to business. Plus, seeing a visual reminder that you have something to do can prevent you from double-booking. If your cue to go to the gym is 5 p.m., it will take you a few weeks to get into the habit of declining an invitation for drinks after work. Therefore, blocking it on the calendar every day after work will keep you on track. However, you will need to set yourself up for success by taking a few steps to ensure your signal and action are possible. In the example above: “When work is done, I’ll put on my sneakers…” – you need to have your sneakers packed in your commute bag for this to work. If you have to go home between the office and the gym, you may not be as easily enticed to go outside to complete the workout. My goal over the past few months has been to exercise more in the morning. I restructured my lifestyle a lot to make this possible, but one of the most crucial steps was laying out my workout clothes, sneakers, and gym accessories the night before. So when I wake up, all I have to do is put them on and go.

Stick to your cues, but give yourself some space for the first few weeks. You may find that the schedule you set doesn’t work well with your existing schedule. You simply won’t stick to your goal if you can’t make it work. Research shows that if you follow the cue method, it will take on average about two months for the habit to form, so use this time to take note of what works, what doesn’t, and what could be changed. If you have a goal to be more connected with friends and family, for example, you might align your calling signal at home with the time you spend doing the dishes every night, only to discover that you’re too tired in the evening or eat out too often for that one to stay. Changing the signal to call home when you get in the car to drive to work in the morning might work better. Just make sure you stick with it once you figure out the best timing.