The New Year always brings with it a cultural tradition of new possibilities. We see it as a chance for renewal.

We begin to dream of new possible selves. We design our ideal self or an image that is quite different from what we are now.

For some of us, we roll that dreamy film in our heads just because it is the beginning of the New Year, but we are serious about making changes. We just make some half hard resolution and it evaporates after a week or two. The experience makes us less successful and leads us to discount ability to change in the future. It’s not the changes impossible, but it won’t last unless our resolutions are supported with plans for implementation. We have to make our intensions manageable by detailing the specific steps that will carry us to our goal.

Say your goal is to lose weight by dieting and cutting off sweets. But one night you just have to have a cookie and you know there is a bag of your favorites in the cupboard. You want one, you eat two, you check the bag and find out that you’ve just shot 132 calories. You say to yourself, “What the hell. ” and polish off the whole bag. Then you begin to draw all kinds of unpleasant conclusions about yourself. To protect your sense of yourself, you begin to discount the goal. You may think, “Well , dieting wasn’t that important to me and I wouldn’t make it anyhow.” So you’ll abandon the goal and return to your bad habits.