Will your New Year’s resolution beat the odds?

Will your New Year’s resolution beat the odds?

17th December 2013

If history is to repeat itself, 45% of us will make New Year’s resolutions this year, with the most popular goals being; lose weight, get organised, spend less money, enjoy life more and stay fit and healthy. However, according to a study by the University of Scranton, only a mere 8% of people actually achieve their goals. Even Richard Branson, a man driven by deadlines and goals questioned himself last year as he reviewed his 2012 list and saw there was more than one goal that he had barely moved the needle on. He’s not alone in this; in fact, one in four people make the same resolution every year, which implies that they never actually make any progress (but keep doing the same thing).

So what is it that the successful 8% do that the rest of us don’t? For them, thinking about what they want to achieve is not enough, and neither is just writing down their goals. The study identified that those who were explicit in setting out a clear path to accomplish each goal were 10 times more likely to achieve them. Robyn Pearce from www.gettingagrip.com, aka ‘The Time Queen’ turned her life around using goal setting and time management techniques and for the past 21 years has run a very successful international consultancy specialising in these areas. “December and January is a time when a lot of our clients review where they are at and make new plans. Goal setting is so beneficial that for many of them, it becomes a habitual process that they use to set themselves up for the coming year. It always amazes me how much more people accomplish when they have clear goals and a clear path to follow. Time management and Goalsetting tend to go hand in hand because once you have identified your goals and what you need to do to reach them you are then automatically more conscious of what you spend your time doing.”

Ms. Pearce cites that consistently making small changes and having progress deadlines throughout the year can be the best way to achieve long-term goals, so that you keep moving towards your objective. Often goals can seem too ‘big’ to accomplish without a plan and of course you need to be prepared for the ‘difficult’ moments, especially if your goal is quitting smoking or losing weight. In response to demand, Robyn Pearce will be running a Goalsetting workshop on the 30th January 2014, from 7-9pm at The Parenting Place, Greenlane, Auckland. Attendees will work through the 2014 goalsetting toolkit and leave with very clear goals and an action plan to achieve them. Ticket price: $179 + GST.

For more information go to http://www.gettingagrip.com/goal-setting-workshop

Resources:
http://www.statisticbrain.com/new-years-resolution-statistics/
http://www.virgin.com/entrepreneur/new-year’s-resolutions-what’s-going-be-different-2013

ENDS

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