Tips on Achieving Your New Year's Resolutions

With 2015 right around the corner millions of people will be making their annual New Year’s resolutions. But sadly, for most of them, come February those high hopes of success will be nothing but another missed opportunity.

Here are some tips to help you actually achieve your New Year’s resolutions this time around.

Realize that winning isn’t everything, but wanting to win is. Winners have a “whatever it takes” attitude. They’ve made the decision to pay any price and bear any burden in the name of victory.
Know that 99% compliance is failure. You wouldn’t cheat on your spouse in a committed relationship, so don’t cheat on something as important as your resolutions.
Expect to feel pain or suffer. Most people run into an obstacle and seek escape. Have a plan to push forward when this happens. If you’re not ready to suffer during adversity, you’re not going to be successful.
Don’t focus on how to do it, but rather, why you should do it? Why do you want this goal to become a reality? The intensity of emotion with which this question is answered will determine whether the dream comes alive or dies.
Get really clear about what you want to change. Don’t just say “I want to lose weight,” but get specific and say “By March 1 I want to lose 15 pounds. I’m going to eat well, exercise each day and get really committed to doing this once and for all.”
Setting a timeline will help avoid procrastination.
77% of what we say to ourselves is negative, so don’t give into the negative thoughts that the goal is impossible. Keep asking yourself how can I make this happen?
Feed your visions and starve your fears. The best way to do this is by creating a vision board. If you want to lose weight for example, cutout pictures of really fit people and tape them on a poster board. Hang the vision board in a very visible location. This will reinforce the goals into your subconscious.
One of the biggest problems is that most people have no means of accountability or a support system in place. Go after your goals with a partner who really makes you push yourself. Even better, find someone who has already achieved what you are setting out after and have them coach you.
Avoid delusion and operate from objective reality. In other words, realize that making a change is going to be hard work, not a walk in the park.
Stop caring about what other people think of your goals. Psychologists call it “approval addiction” and once you overcome it to any significant degree, you are free of the psychological chains that bind you from ever experiencing world-class success.
Write a letter describing your life to a friend detailing the way you want things to be in five years. Some prefer one year, others like three years. It’s whatever motivates you the most. Read this letter every day and it will help keep you on track.