Why New Year's Resolutions Fail

In this episode of New Ideal Live, Don Watkins and Nikos Sotirakopoulos discuss New Year’s resolutions, what makes them difficult to maintain, and how integrated, contextual thinking can help automatize good habits.

Among the topics covered:

The unhealthy motivation of the “fresh start effect” vs. healthy motivations for resolutions;
Why the fact of automatization makes change both desirable and challenging;
Why a clear, first-handed purpose is necessary for sticking with goals;
The fatal error of oscillating between “all-or-nothing” perfectionism and “I’ll do it when I feel like it” subjectivism;
How to learn from resolution failures;
Framing your resolutions as aspirations for the life you want to live and the person you want to be;
How setting goals about outcomes, processes, and themes are interrelated;
How choosing detailed resolution goals in the context of the possibility of failure helps to strategize for success.

Mentioned in the discussion are Atomic Habits: An Easy and Proven Way to Build Good Habits and Break Bad Ones by James Clear; How to Fail at Almost Everything and Still Win Big by Scott Adams, and The Romantic Manifesto by Ayn Rand.

This episode was recorded on December 29, 2022. Listen to the discussion below. Listen and subscribe from your mobile device on Apple Podcasts, Google Podcasts, Spotify or Stitcher. Watch archived podcasts here.