Ringing in the new year also comes along with new resolutions to encourage ourselves to become the best versions of ourselves. It is a great opportunity to look to ourselves, yet placing an excessive emphasis on your New Year’s Resolution will ultimately be met with disappointment.
So many New Year’s Resolutions, and goals in general, fail when they lack specificity, a plan on how the goal will be achieved, accountability, and when the goal is unrealistic. To ensure success, try creating a small goal focusing on one habit that you’d like to address. This small goal can be reassessed and modified periodically as you are seeing your desired change.
Finally, during this time, there are many promotions for different fad diets. Fad diets are proven to not be effective in sustainable weight loss and most have undesired associated health consequences. Various characteristics of a fad diet to look out for include promise of an increased amount of weight, specifically in a short window of time; requirement of the elimination of a particular food group; promotion of one specific food or food group; and encouragement of a particular product or liquid meal replacement.
Given the promised results, participating in a fad diet can be tempting; however, it is essential that lifestyle changes are sustainable. Unfortunately, the faster weight loss is achieved, the faster you will gain it back when your behaviors deviate from the diet; therefore, sticking to small changes at a time can promote an overall more healthful and sustainable outcome.