How to Start the New Year - Goals, Values or Acceptance and Gratitude?

Some people love setting and striving for fresh goals and sharing them for accountability, but what I am noticing more in 2024 is a backlash against the traditional New Year resolutions or goals.

This seems to be either in favour of choosing a word to guide your year or one of acceptance and gratitude for the life you are already living.

It is perhaps no surprise that some people have moved away from New Year’s resolutions - it is common for people not to achieve their goals or, achieving them and failing to be satisfied.

Research shows that we are more likely to achieve our goals when they are aligned with our values and purpose as we are more inclined to apply sustained effort.

Attainment of self-concordant goals leads to increases in well-being (Sheldon & Elliot, 1999), however, we may not set goals that are authentically matched with our true interests, being influenced instead by external pressures and negative emotions.

It is easy to fall into the trap of setting goals you think you should have rather than goals you are interested in achieving. Setting these self-concordant goals takes reflection time and strong self-awareness, something which coaching can support.

We each need to figure out which start to the new year works for us. My approach this year is a bit of a mixture. I have gone back to my values, and checked to see if there are any I want to change or dial up. I then thought of ways that I can bring those values present in the year ahead.

For example, I want to focus on gratitude more and to try and tame my striving for an appreciation of some of the things I take for granted. Courage is a value I have for my business, which I also want to focus on for this year which means taking some uncomfortable steps that I delayed last year!

I would love to know your approach to the new year, do you set goals, have a word as a guide or just keep on carrying on with acceptance and gratitude?

If you would like a thinking partner to support you with your approach this year, then send me a message.

Sheldon, K. M., & Elliot, A. J. (1999). Goal striving, need satisfaction, and longitudinal well-being: The self-concordance model. Journal of Personality and Social Psychology, 76(3), 482–497.