Making Habits that Stick for the New Year

I love the turning of a new year. Actually any milestone a new month or even a new week. There’s something about a start of a time frame that makes everything feel possible and the failures or negativity of the past can’t pass through the magic barrier of the new time frame. So with this in mind I’m sharing with you how I go about making a habit that sticks for the new year and beyond.

Last Christmas and New Year I was incredibly sick which caused me to look at what my habits were around staying healthy, so I could continue to do what I loved and ward off the need for what I thought was drastic procedure in order to function normally. I had to turn around my bad habit of always putting everything else first above my health.

Here’s the basic steps to get you started on setting good habits for yourself.

1. Determine what the consequences will be for not having this new habit.
2. What are the rewards for creating this new habit.
3. What’s the minimum I could do to start this habit?
4. Add your new habit to your schedule and diarise. Use alerts if you like that sort of thing, personally I can’t stand my phone beeping at me but do what works for you.
5. Record your progress and live in the moment along every milestone of completing even the smallest of successful habit actions.

Being mindful will create a higher recognition for your brain that this is a routine and that is where the magic lies in creating habits that stick.

I’d love to here the rewards you get from creating and sticking with your new habits leave a comment below so we can all celebrate together.

Happy New Year and may all your plans be fruitful in 2015.

Carolyn