Every January, we do the same thing. We wake up on the 1st with a long list of promises to ourselves: gym every morning, no junk food, eight glasses of water daily, early to bed, early to rise.
We feel motivated, maybe even invincible. But by mid-February, most of these resolutions have quietly slipped away. And by December, they've become the subject of our own jokes: "Remember when I said I'd quit sugar?" we laugh, slightly embarrassed.
As a clinical nutritionist, I've observed this pattern repeat itself year after year, not just with my clients, but also in my own life. And I've learned something important: the problem isn't that we lack willpower or discipline. The problem is that we're setting ourselves up to fail from day one.
The myth of the fresh start
There's something magical about New Year's Day, isn't there? We feel like the calendar flipping from December 31st to January 1st somehow transforms us into different people, people who suddenly can overhaul their entire lives overnight. But the truth is we don't change that much in just one day.
Think about it. On December 31st, you went to bed as someone who sleeps at 2 AM, eats out four times a week, and hasn't exercised in months. On January 1st, you're still that same person, just with a date change and perhaps an overdose of optimism.
Expecting yourself to suddenly become someone who wakes up at 6 AM for yoga, meal-preps every Sunday, and never touches fried food again - that would be AMAZING but let’s get real; it's setting yourself up for disappointment.
This doesn't mean you can't change. You absolutely can. But change happens gradually, not overnight.
Why big resolutions often fail
Let me share something I see time and again in my clinical practice. A client comes to me in January, full of enthusiasm, and declares: "From today, I'm eating completely clean. No sugar, no oil, no maida, no outside food. I'll cook everything at home, exercise daily, and be in bed by 10 PM."
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I always pause when I hear this. Then I ask: "What's your life like right now?"
Usually, the answer involves working late hours, traveling for work, managing a household, dealing with stress, and may be caring for elderly parents or young children. Their current routine might involve sleeping at midnight, eating lunch at 3 PM because meetings ran over, and grabbing dinner from outside because they're too exhausted to cook.
And now they want to transform all of this overnight.
Here's what happens. The first day goes well, maybe even the second. By the third day, they have an unexpected work deadline. They skip the workout. They're too tired to cook, so they order food. They stay up late finishing a presentation. By day five, they feel like they've failed, and the entire resolution falls apart. Worse, they feel guilty and frustrated, thinking, "I can't even stick to a simple resolution."
But it wasn't a simple resolution. It was an extreme overhaul that didn't account for their actual life.
The power of addition over subtraction
One of the most valuable lessons I've learned, both professionally and personally, is this: goals that add something to your life are far more sustainable than goals that take something away.
Let me explain with an example. During the COVID-19 lockdown, when everyone was told not to go out, what happened? The person who had been sitting on the sofa all their life suddenly felt an overwhelming urge to go out. Why? Because telling yourself what you cannot do triggers a sense of deprivation and rebellion, even if you never wanted to do that thing in the first place.
The same applies to food. If you tell yourself, "I will never eat out for an entire week," you're setting up a mental battle. Your brain immediately starts craving exactly what you've forbidden. But if instead you say, "I'll eat home-cooked meals five times this week," when you currently eat home-cooked food only three times, something interesting happens. You've added something positive, and the number of times you eat out automatically reduces. Same result, but achieved through addition rather than restriction.
This approach works because it's psychologically easier to do something than to not do something. "Drink two more glasses of water" is easier to follow than "Don't drink cold drinks." "Go to bed 30 minutes earlier" is easier than "Don't use your phone at night."
Making resolutions that stick: Know yourself first
Before you make any resolution, take a moment to honestly assess your current lifestyle. Not the lifestyle you wish you had, but the one you're actually living.
Ask yourself:
What time do I usually sleep and wake up?
How often do I eat home-cooked meals right now?
What does my work schedule look like?
Do I have days that are predictable, and days that are chaotic?
This honest self-assessment is crucial because your resolution needs to fit into your real life, not an imaginary one. If your work requires you to stay up late some nights, don't plan for 6 AM workouts every single day. If you travel frequently for work, don't build a resolution around elaborate home cooking. Instead, think about what you can realistically sustain given your actual circumstances.
The goal is to work with your lifestyle, not against it. Find the pockets of predictability in your routine; those are where lasting change takes root.
The two-glass-of-water principle
People often dismiss small changes. "What's the point of just drinking two extra glasses of water? That's not even a real resolution," they say. But here's what they miss: if you drink just two extra glasses of water every single day for a month, that's 60 extra glasses. Over a year, that's 730 glasses of water your body received that it wouldn't have otherwise.
This consistency, this regularity of even small actions, has a far bigger impact on your health than grand gestures that fizzle out quickly.
I've seen this play out repeatedly. The client who simply added one serving of vegetables to their lunch every day saw better results over six months. Why? Because they built a habit. Small, consistent changes compound over time, creating lasting transformation without much effort.
Realistic goal-setting: The three-day rule
Here's a practical framework I recommend: when you're setting any health resolution, ask yourself if you can commit to it three days a week initially.
Want to exercise? Don't commit to daily workouts right away. Pick three days when you know you typically have a lighter workload or more predictable schedules. Maybe Tuesday, Thursday, and Sunday work for you. Start there. Actually, do it for three months. Then, if you want, add a fourth day.
Want to improve your diet? Choose three dinners a week that you'll ensure are home-cooked and balanced. See which three days work best with your schedule. Maybe you have more time on weekends and Wednesdays. Perfect. Commit to those three days with complete honesty.
This approach has a beautiful side effect: often, people find that once they successfully maintain something three days a week, they naturally start doing it more often because they've built the habit and seen the benefits. But even if they don't, three days a week for a year is still 156 days of positive change.
Climbing one step at a time
Think of your health journey like climbing stairs. You wouldn't try to leap from the ground floor to the eleventh floor in one jump. You'd take it step by step, each one bringing you higher.
But New Year's resolutions often have us trying to leap to that top step. And when we inevitably can't, we don't just fall back, we feel so defeated that we stop trying altogether.
Here's what's crucial: when you set an unrealistic goal and fail, it creates a ripple effect. Someone who fails at their "perfect diet" might also abandon their evening walks, thinking, "What's the point? I can't stick to anything anyway."
This is why starting small isn't just practical, it's protective. Small successes build confidence and momentum. They prove you can change, which makes you more likely to keep changing.
The quarter-year approach
Instead of making resolutions for the entire year, try this: commit to something for just one quarter, January to March. Three months. That's it.
Can you go to bed 30 minutes earlier than usual for three months? Can you pack lunch from home three days a week for three months? Can you take a 15-minute walk after dinner for three months?
When you frame it this way, it feels much more achievable. And here's what happens when you succeed: you get to April and realize, "I did this for three months. I can keep going."
This approach also allows you to reassess and adjust. Maybe you discover that packing lunch three days a week was easy, and you're ready to make it four days. Or maybe you realise that evening walks work better for you than morning ones. These insights only come from actually doing something consistently, not from making grand plans.
When life happens
Of course, even with the best planning, life will happen. You'll have a week where work is crazy. You'll get sick. You'll have family commitments. There will be festivals, celebrations, travel. This is normal. This is life.
The difference between sustainable change and yo-yo resolutions is how you handle these disruptions. If you've committed to a rigid, all-or-nothing approach, one disruption can feel like total failure. But if you've built your resolution on realistic, flexible foundations, you can pause, adjust, and resume without guilt or drama.
Missed your three workout days this week because of a project deadline? That's okay. Do two next week. Couldn't cook at home because relatives were visiting? That's fine. Start again once things settle.
The bottom line
As we begin this new year, I want to encourage you to think differently about resolutions. Make them small. Make them specific. Make them realistic for your actual life, not some idealized version of it.
You don't need to become a completely different person overnight. You just need to become a slightly better version of yourself, consistently, over time.
Drink two extra glasses of water. Sleep 30 minutes earlier. Add one vegetable to your meals. Walk for 10 minutes. Cook one extra meal at home each week.
Your resolution doesn't need to be impressive; it just needs to be doable. A resolution you actually keep, no matter how small, is infinitely more valuable than an ambitious one you abandon by February.
Start small. Stay consistent. You'll be surprised how far you can go.
The opinions expressed in this article are those of the author and do not purport to reflect the opinions or views of THE WEEK.
