Intentions, Resolutions, Failures, and Starting Again

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Source: Josh Bartok/Used with permission

Each year, in late December, I consider writing a post on resolutions. Then time passed, and it was no longer the New Year, so I abandoned that plan. On Jan. 23, 2024, I realized that is also the pattern many people experience with their resolutions. They resolve to do something (or stop doing something), don’t follow through—and then abandon the plan.

Given my interest in disrupting this pattern for myself and helping others do the same, I am writing about resolutions now, when the supposed time for resolutions has passed. A central principle of behavior change is recognizing the failure to engage in a desired behavior (or refrain from an undesired one) as a momentary lapse rather than seeing it as a permanent state (Dimeff & Marlatt, 1998) and then trying again. And again, and again.

Resolutions are an interesting phenomenon. Many people make them, yet the majority do not follow through on them. Numerous factors contribute to this challenge in trying to make meaningful changes in our lives:

• Resolutions often focus on wanting to be other than we are in some way (e.g., lose weight, be more social). While all efforts at change include some degree of wanting to be other than we are, the typical form that resolutions take can particularly elicit self-criticism and self-blame—which undermines efforts at change.
• Changing habits is hard and requires consistent practice, success by gradual approximation, and support—all of which we often don’t reflect on when making our resolutions.
• We often make large resolutions and consider them in absolute terms so that once we falter in our commitment, we feel we have definitively failed—which further undermines our efforts to make changes.
• By focusing on behavioral change, we often fail to consider the meaning and deeper intentions underlying our goals and resolutions. This approach limits our sense of purpose, as well as our flexibility in working on our change efforts.
• Resolutions inherently place responsibility for change on us individually and do not attend to the realities of our contexts, which can be invalidating and discouraging.
• January 1 is an arbitrary date, and a year is a very long time frame for making changes. This maximizes the chances of failure. Planning on gradual and sustainable changes can increase chances for success.

Identify valued directions and intentions.

When we focus solely on a behavioral change we want to make, we can lose a sense of purpose and meaning that comes from instead identifying what is important to us and how we want to be in the world. For example, instead of a resolution or goal to “make more friends,” we might recognize that we value meaningful connections, being vulnerable and supportive of others, or expressing kindness and care to others. We can act consistently with any of those values right away (and at any time we remind ourselves of them.), which will also make it more likely that we cultivate friendships that help to meet that behavioral goal.

By focusing on the values and meaning, we can flexibly adapt any behavioral goal and ensure that our actions in that direction are more satisfying and rewarding.

Growth versus deficits, successes versus lapses

One of the greatest challenges in any effort at behavior change is the way that efforts to change can lead to self-criticism, self-blame, and disappointment. One way to counter this natural human experience is by framing our intentions in terms of cultivating growth rather than remediating deficiencies.

When our intention involves doing something less (e.g., eating sweets, drinking, or doom scrolling), we may want to identify things we want to do more of in place of these habits (e.g., identifying healthy snacks we enjoy, reading novels). In addition, as we engage in change efforts, we can make sure we notice the times we are successful rather than focusing solely on the times we fail to act in line with our intentions. Planning rewards for successes can also help to increase intended actions.

Decades ago, when I was quitting smoking, I noticed that no matter how long I went without a cigarette or any lapse, I felt like a complete failure because my goal was to stop smoking (completely). However, when I adjusted my attention so that I gave myself credit for each day I went without smoking, even when I had an occasional lapse, I was able to still feel on track and, therefore, gradually able to increase the days I didn’t smoke. And eventually I was indeed able to stop completely.

Awareness inclusive of context

Changing our behavioral habits requires our attention. When we label the changes we are making as connected to our deficits or label lapses as failures, we naturally want to avoid paying more attention to these things—which interferes with our ability to make these changes. Even when we address those barriers to attention, it is easy to fall into habitual patterns and fail to notice opportunities to practice the new habits we want to address.

We can build our habits of attention using specific strategies. We can also work to expand our awareness so that we recognize our context, including external and systemic barriers that may interfere with our behavior change efforts. This can help us to validate the reality of the challenges we are facing, which can reduce self-blame, an internal barrier to effective change.

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We can also bring gentle awareness to any time when we fail to act consistent with our intentions so that we can learn from these instances and change our efforts accordingly. For example, we may notice that we are having trouble remembering our intentions, so we need to find ways to remind ourselves more frequently. Or we may notice that we are more likely to lapse when we are more distressed or experience an interpersonal stressor. This indicates that these are moments when we want to attend to our needs and reconnect to our values so we can maintain our commitment to the new intentions.

Or perhaps we may recognize that we struggle more when we feel isolated, so soliciting support in our efforts would be helpful. You might try reframing imagined “failures” as ongoing opportunities to learn and grow.

Successful change necessitates responding to these lapses with compassion and understanding, recognizing the factors that may have led to these lapses, revising our intentions or goals or the approach we are taking accordingly, and trying again. And again, and again. Fall down seven times, get up eight—with compassion.

Gratitude to Josh Bartok for editing help.