Rethinking New Years Resolutions Part Two: One Bite at a time
By Adam Nash MA LPC
Have you heard of tiny Melinda Mae,Who ate a monstrous whale?She thought she could,She said she would,So she started in right at the tail.And everyone said, "You're much too small,"But that didn't bother Melinda at all.She took little bites and she chewed very slow,Just like a good girl should......And in eighty-nine years she ate that whaleBecause she said she would! - Shel Silverstein (1)
Every year millions of people set New Year’s Resolutions. Almost always they are major life goals like “lose 50 pounds”, “Stop drinking alcohol”, “workout every day” or “be a better person”. These are all amazing things to focus on. I myself started 2025 with Dry January because I had felt that I was drinking more often than I would like. However, these major goals often fail and we are life wondering if we are ever going to be able to change our lives. So, how do we set better goals to reach the life that we so desperately want? Or are we doomed to staying right where we are and never living a healthier life?
Leveraging Dopamine for Goal Setting:
In the last blog we explored the dopamine cycle. Now lets take some time to look at how we can leverage it to help us with goal setting and achieving. As we set new goals we, typically, feel a pretty strong burst of dopamine and start to feel pretty good about the goal we set. However, once we start to do something hard, go to the gym for example, our dopamine levels drop and we begin to think “I’d much rather go get a donut than workout” and we are back where we started, or even worse. How then do we set goals for ourselves that don’t result in us just ending up back where we started.
Goal Setting Techniques:
“It’s not what you preach, it’s what you tolerate.” - Jocko Wilink (2)
Before we look at a few goal setting techniques we need to talk about one thing. Any goal worth achieving is going to be hard. Avoiding suffering and pain will mean we are avoiding moving towards any goal that is meaningful. As Michael Easter talked about in Scarcity Brain “The worst habits are things we can do over and over and over in rapid succession—eventually to our detriment. These behaviors are often fun and rewarding in the short term but backfire in the long run” meaning that any easy and painless task will lead us down a path of addiction and unhealthiness. Now, let’s take a look at some of my go to goal setting strategies.
Goal setting technique #1: Take it down to the smallest detail.
In his book Every Tool’s a Hammer Adam Savage (yes of Mythbusters) talks about his techniques for crafting and building and how he breaks down projects into smaller and smaller goals till the project is completed. Which if you are a very high detail person might be the most effective tool for goal setting. In this way of viewing goal writing he attempts to take everything down a super small detail which can be helpful but also overwhelming.
His process looks something like the picture below
As you can see he also has boxes next to each step and he will fill in the boxes as the part of the project is finished. Then each morning he will rewrite the list with anything with a fully filled in box eliminated from the new list. Again, this is a great list if you are highly detail oriented and love to know every step that you have to do along the way. (3)
Goal setting techniques #2: At least goals.
I am sure we have all been in a position where we set a big goal for ourselves, like working out 7 days a week, only to miss a couple days and totally give up on working out at all for the rest of the week. This is a situation where I like to use what I call “At Least Goals” which is where you set a minimum goal, workout twice a week, while aiming at a higher number, aiming to hit 5-7 workouts a week. What this goal setting technique allows you to do it two fold. 1. It allows you to hit an attainable goal to get a hit of dopamine. 2. It allows you to stop the cycle of shame. Because you are more likely to hit the smaller goal you will be less likely to shame yourself for missing goals and give up, however you will also be driven to hit bigger goals.
Goal setting techniques #3: One goal at a time. (or add as you go)
Finally, I think a great way to set goals is by setting one goal at a time. If I am going to start cleaning the house I will often set goals like this 1. Do the Dishes. I will then not add anything to my list until that task is completed. Once I have finished the dishes I will cross out 1 and then add 2. Fold Laundry. Then I continue this process until I have completed enough tasks to feel like I was productive for the day. This way of setting goals is a great way to avoid becoming overwhelmed because you can focus on one single goal until that goal is accomplished or is now a lifestyle. I used this to great effect a few years back when I set a goal for myself of going to the gym 3 times a week. I did not worry about weight loss, Personal Records, or Macros until I had made going to the gym a lifestyle and then I could move on to setting a new goal around going to the gym.
Moving goals into lifestyles is where we get true, lifelong, change that results in us living the life we want to live. As you rethink your New Years Resolutions I encourage you to set good goals and begin to move towards the lifestyle you have always wanted.
References:
