Most New Years’ resolutions don’t last through April. A lot of people beat themselves up for failing to accomplish whatever they wanted to do, but sometimes the way they set their goal was a major reason why they didn’t succeed. At Carolina Dunes Behavioral Health, we work with our patients to ensure that they know how to set and achieve goals that matter to them.
Goals Need to be SMART
When you think about most New Years’ resolutions, they usually sound something like, “I want to lose weight” or “I want to get into shape,” and while those are things that would benefit a lot of people, those aren’t complete goals that will allow a person to know when they have accomplished them or even demonstrated progress. You are far more likely to be successful if your goals are SMART:
- Specific – Your goal should be clear enough that anyone reading it knows what you’re going to do. If your goal is to get out of the house more, what steps are you going to take to ensure that you reach your goal? Where will you go? Who will you spend time with? How will you entice yourself to follow through on days when the weather is unpleasant or you just don’t feel like going?
- Measurable – How will you know that you have reached your goal? Do you want to leave your house every day? 5 days per week? How long will you be out of the house?
- Attainable – Is your goal realistic? What factors outside of your control could prevent you from meeting your goal? If you’re only leaving the house a few times per month now, adding a day or two per week might be as much as you can handle right now. Giving yourself a goal that you know you can win will help you establish momentum you can build upon later.
- Relevant – Why do you want to do this? Why is this goal important to you? Are you doing this for your mental health? To combat loneliness?
- Time limited – How long will this goal last? If there are incremental steps, when will each of them conclude?
Putting all of these pieces together, a goal to get out of your house might read more like, “I will leave my house at least three days per week, for an hour or more at a time. I will go to the library on Tuesdays, therapy on Thursdays, and church on Sundays. I will call my sister to see if she would like to go with me to church and the library, and I will have dinner with my parents after church. I want to leave my house more often so that I feel less isolated and lonely. For every week that I make it out of the house at least three days, I will treat myself to a frozen coffee from Starbucks on the following Tuesday. I will do this through the end of 2025.”
Write it Down
Once you have your goal, write it down somewhere. This could be a post-it note on your mirror, a dry erase board on your fridge, a document on your computer, a reminder on your phone, or anything else you will see daily. There are also apps you can use to track your success:
Stack Habits Together
People are often more successful in creating new habits if they perform the desired behavior alongside an existing habit. For example, if you reliably visit your parents for dinner every Sunday, adding an activity outside the house immediately before or after is more likely to work than leaving the house on a day that you aren’t normally gone.
Break Down Goals
Sometimes, a goal is very important but so big that it can feel impossible. If you have a goal like this, think about how you can take on small pieces of it a bit at a time. You might not be ready to leave your house three times per week yet, but maybe you are ready to leave twice per week. Your initial goal might be to leave twice per week for the next three months and then increase to three times per week, starting in April. You might even decide to add another step once you have some momentum going, so that you’re leaving four times per week by July.
Many “Right” Ways
Try not to get too stuck on achieving your goals the same way as another person achieves theirs. Even if someone else has a goal related to leaving the house more, their reason for this goal, the activities they do when they leave the house, how often they are leaving, or how they are holding themselves accountable for the goal may all be different and that is fine. We all tackle problems differently and the only thing that matters is that you’re doing what works best for you.
At Carolina Dunes Behavioral Health in Leland, North Carolina, we love to see people succeed. That’s why we offer a structured, therapeutic environment for people who are experiencing acute psychiatric episodes. The services we provide allow our patients to smoothly transition back into their communities.
