Why I am taking a different approach to New Years this year and why you should too

As the holiday season draws to a close with the inevitable approach of the last day of the year, it is also inevitable to feel just a hint of dread at the unfurling of a new year, accompanied by a fair amount of pressure and expectation. Usually, the planning and goal-setting of this time of year – people making New Year’s resolutions left, right, and centre – takes everyone in its stride, and we are all caught up in making our own resolutions and writing them down in the new journal we bought for ourselves (because one of our resolutions is to start journaling – a resolution we have had since we were 12).

Then, in the second week of January, both the resolutions and the journal are forgotten, cast aside in the rush of returning to the real world. The reason these resolutions fall short is that they are never grounded in anything specific enough and so have nothing upon which to take root. Most resolutions are vague aspirations or ideas, like ‘go to the gym more’ or ‘eat less sugar’. But these are not easily actionable and so will simply not happen; no one is that disciplined, especially when the goals are to take away something that you enjoy (or at least, superficially enjoy), or do something you really do not enjoy.

The key to building habits or keeping resolutions is to know exactly how these habits work, so that when the time comes, the only thing left to do is start

Instead, a better way of going about resolutions is to first reflect on the past year (or at least the past quarter; my memory does not go very far back). Look at all the areas of your life right now, and make a decision: more of this, less of that, continue, discard, or introduce. This way, you are able to visualise what specific areas of your life you want to work on, which provides an excellent foundation to look forward to next year. There are lots of ways to split your life into different areas, and I find that it can be difficult to do, so don’t worry about being efficient here – the areas that come to mind are probably the ones that you want to focus on anyway.

Once you’ve done this reflection exercise, consider the areas that you felt needed the most change. Take one topic, and think about how exactly this can be implemented into your life: What time of day will you do it? Where will it happen? How long will it take? Realistic questions like these make the change much easier, because there is less to think about. The key to building habits or keeping resolutions is to know exactly how these habits work, so that when the time comes, the only thing left to do is start.

I love drawing out a table to track what habits I do every day, but there are a multitude of apps that can also track your progress with your resolutions

Something that can really help in this whole process is to get your affairs in order. This doesn’t have to be much of a bigger deal than an end-of-week reset, but enough to feel like your mind has cleared. Take 10 minutes to dump all of the tasks and thoughts you have onto a piece of paper (I find that pen-to-paper contact really gets the juices flowing), and from that, start to see what needs to be done to begin 2026 on a fresh slate.

Now, much of this might not be new information: a lot of it is based on the teachings of many self-help books, old wives’ tales, or just common sense. The nugget of wisdom that I have, though, which I really think makes so much difference, is starting your habits before the countdown. If you already established (at least minutely) the habits you want in your life before New Year’s actually comes around, then the effort required is not to start whole new habits, but simply to maintain them, and so there is much less resistance to overcome. I love drawing out a table to track what habits I do every day, but there are a multitude of apps that can also track your progress with your resolutions.

So in short, reflect on the past, start your habits in the present, and watch how easily they become part of your routine in the future. Best of luck, and happy New Year!