With a new year peeking just around the corner, we find ourselves looking forward to the opening of new doors and the windows of opportunity to jump through. “New year, new me” is what we say, seeing the coming year as a new beginning.
Around this time, we usually start thinking about our New Year’s resolutions – our personal goals or promises, which help set our intentions for the year to come. These can span across a number of things we’d like to improve on or accomplish in life, like what we envision for our careers, the ways we want to better our relationships with family and friends, getting to check off points on our bucket list, and so on. But what about improving and accomplishing things just for ourselves? What about creating resolutions to improve our own emotional, mental, and physical welfare?
Tips for Achievable New Year Goals in 2025
Here are some tips for creating achievable goals that support your own wellbeing this coming 2025:
Keep it specific and measurable
Narrowing down your goals is a good place to start. Setting concrete, measurable or achievable goals can give you better direction in where you want to take it and how you’d like to approach it. For example, rather than saying “I’d like to be happier this year”, you could say “I will try to spend at least 1 hour a day doing my favorite hobby.” This can keep you from overwhelming yourself and help you better keep track of your progress.
Take it easy
Working on yourself takes time, and that’s alright. Self-improvement does not happen overnight, so it’s completely fine to think of little ways you can start by and then keep building up from there. For example, maybe you’d like to improve your mental and physical state by going to the gym. You cannot go straight to doing extreme workouts without conditioning your body and building up to it first. You cannot expect your muscles to be completely toned after a week of gyming either. It’s okay to take it easy and take things one step at a time, you control your own pace.
Be ambitious but realistic
While resolutions can span from little goals to big ambitions, it would be good to keep in mind that dreams don’t come true right away, especially if they are big ones. Forgetting this can lead us to feeling frustrated or disappointed in ourselves. Setting realistic goals and creating a strategy/strategies for them can help keep you grounded in what you can do to achieve your plans. Being mindful of your own limitations and being aware of how things might not always go your way can also help mitigate those feelings of frustration and disappointment.
Enjoy what you set out to do
When setting up your resolutions, try to make sure that you can always find joy in what you set out to do. Working towards your goals would feel a lot less like a chore if you are enjoying the process. Even on days that you might feel like your efforts aren’t paying off, try to look for the highlights and see the good that comes from it, no matter how small it might be. As much as possible, enjoy the journey you embark on, because all those moments play a role in shaping who you become. 💗
Have a Happy New Year!
About the Author
S. Verzosa is a BS Psychology graduate from the Ateneo de Manila University. Lover of fiction, art, music, dance, and the understanding of all those around.
