Be Smarter About Your New Years Resolutions

How to make change stick

Curious about working with me? I’m taking on more clients for therapeutic and coaching work. What does this look like? Well, it’s unique to each person. We can together explore your goals and strategies to work towards them, and skillfully address the inevitable barriers on the way. You can read more about me and how I work on my website. And for a limited time, I’m offering free consults. Reach out for more details.

Most of us aren’t all that good at sticking to our new year's resolutions. I have ADHD, and us ADHD folk are especially bad at cultivating habits and are prone to unhealthy addiction.

I’ve also worked with a lot of ADHD folk who found me through my Meditation for ADHD video, so I’m no stranger to the difficulties of healthy habit formation, addiction, and making meaningful change, so let me offer some advice to help you make the most out of 2025.

1. Change occurs as a reflection of your values and identity

Any form of meaningful change is a change in identity. And all meaningful change in identity is a shift in values.

For example, let’s say your New Year's resolution is to be healthier. If you’re not already making healthy choices then it’s not really one of your values; it’s an ideal.

Your actions are a reflection of your values. While you may think you value your health, if you’re not making healthy choices then there’s something else you value more. In this case it’s usually comfort.

If you want to make healthier choices, you need to value your health more than you value your comfort.

But this doesn’t mean you need to abandon comfort altogether, you can negotiate a middle ground that works for you. Because – spoiler alert – we aren’t machines and we have needs which include rest, comfort, leisure, relaxation, socialization, play, etc.

Let’s say you make healthy lifestyle changes; you cut out processed foods and excessive sugar; you start eating more fresh vegetables and being more active.

At first, this takes effort, planning, and sacrifice. It’s unlikely all the healthy habits will stick, but with some trial and error and experimentation you eventually find the habits that do stick with you and over time, they become more and more natural.

Eventually, your identity shifts. You went from an unhealthy person trying to be healthy, to a healthy person.

When you truly see yourself as a healthy person, your habits will reflect this. You’ll choose the side salad over fries without even having to think about it.

This takes time, but there’s a lot we can do to speed up the process and set ourselves up for success.

2. Be strategic

A lot of people fail to make meaningful change because they don’t employ any strategy.

As a meditation teacher, one of the most common things I hear is that people would like to meditate more, but don’t end up doing so.

My first response here is to ask “when?”

Where does meditation fit into your day?

And then we look at what’s keeping people from making that change.

Oh you forget? Put it in your calendar or set a recurring alarm.

Oh your back is stiff so you avoid sitting? Find a comfortable chair, or meditate lying down, or do a standing Chi-Gong style meditation to help release your body tension.

You need to make a plan that works for you. And be realistic about it.

I used to have a rule that I wouldn’t pay money for any foods that were unhealthy. So if a friend offered me a treat, or if there were cookies at an event, that’s all ok. But I didn’t buy processed or sugary foods, and I surely never kept any in my house.

3. Find the things that you enjoy, and make positive associations with them

A nutritionist friend once told me not to think about eating healthy as giving up foods you love, but instead about discovering healthy foods you love that also make you feel great.

It’s funny, that when I look at a piece of cake now, I don’t think about how good it will taste, I think about how I’ll feel a little while after eating it.

While I enjoy the taste of sugar, I don’t enjoy the feeling after eating a lot of sugar.

When I eat healthy and clean, I feel great. And I’ve learned to associate those feelings with the foods, so making healthy food choices is easy.

Similarly with exercise, I’ve found the ways of being active that I really enjoy. I personally find jogging a bit boring, but I really love the pump I get from weightlifting and calisthenics. And it’s fun to watch my progress too.

You’re unlikely to keep up a habit if you don’t enjoy it on some level. If you really don’t like working out, but you like rollerblading, then rollerblading is probably going to be the better choice to stay fit, even if it’s not the most effective workout.

4. Addictions need to be replaced with something

A lot of people want to quit smoking, but don’t make much of a plan beyond stopping smoking.

The question is, what will you do next time you crave a cigarette?

If you’re addicted to smoking, smoking is doing something for you. It’s likely calming your nerves, soothing your anxiety, or just taking your mind off of something. So you need to find something healthier that also does this.

Maybe you’ll do a breathwork practice, or some push-ups or jumping jacks, or read a book, or go for a walk.

Or you can take up a mindfulness practice and learn to be with the sensations of discomfort instead of trying to escape them. By being open to and present with the sensations of discomfort, you can develop equanimity – the ability to be with discomfort – and this can be utterly life changing.

Over time, developing equanimity allows us to be more and more ok with discomfort, in a way that takes the suffering out of it. As my teacher Shinzen Young says, “it hurts more, but you suffer less.”

And a final note: step back and look at the big picture. If you’re the type that is always busy, always setting goals and doing a lot, maybe you actually want to do less this year. Making time to relax and enjoy the simple things — just giving yourself space to relax and exist — might actually be exactly what you need.