Resolutions That Make You Happier

Maybe you are one of those people who sets resolutions this week. Good for you starting the year with good habits and goals! We applaud your effort but want you to think about things a little differently this year by choosing resolutions that will make you happier.

We realize this sounds obvious but you would be surprised at how often people set goals that make them unhappy. It’s such a frequent occurrence that researchers refer to it as increasing ill-being. Why? We think that it is the same reason you can’t stop eating that raw cookie dough. People just want things that are not good for them.

In hopes of helping you pick resolutions that make you happy, we want to highlight what works and what doesn’t.

No: Extrinsic goals

Extrinsic goals are things like wealth, status, and fame. These generally depend on recognition or validation from others and do not directly satisfy our psychological needs (even though we often think that they will). Extrinsic goals seem valuable, but their value is really based on what they give access to, not the goals themselves.

The pursuit of extrinsic resolutions tends to crowd out more fulfilling pursuits, meaning a person can end up feeling frustrated and unfulfilled even when they succeed in their pursuits. What’s worse, when we succeed in our extrinsic pursuits, we quickly adapt to our new circumstances, and that leads to the escalation of expectations. Social comparison, the tendency to evaluate our success relative to others, usually makes this worse.

Yes: Intrinsic pursuits

The alternative is intrinsic pursuits. Things like self-improvement, physical health, personal relationships, and supporting your community. These goals have value in and of themselves, so the benefit comes regardless of how others react. Focusing on these goals improves our outlook on life, gives us a sense of satisfaction and meaning, and ultimately improves our well-being.

No: Avoidance goals

Avoidance goals are what they sound like: goals based on not doing something. Things like not getting sick or not eating that cookie dough (hey, maybe that’s why you’re getting sick!). The thing is, you never really feel like you’re making progress by not doing something. Plus, "not doing something" puts us in these “aversive mental states,” which lead to anticipatory anxiety (“I hope no one is making cookies tonight”), distracting thoughts (“why does salmonella taste so good?”), and unhealthy impulses (“Tara’s got the mixer out. I need to leave now”). Avoidance goals are also a kind of self-sabotage because they deplete our self-control, and we often end up succumbing to other temptations anyway which makes us feel even worse.

Yes: Approach goals

The alternative is to reframe these into approach goals, or things that we hope to do more of. Unlike avoidance goals, these keep our focus on the positive, which tends to translate into our personal outlook.

Observable progress is also much easier to show this way because we can count the ways that we have moved in the right direction. So, instead of avoiding cookie dough, you can make a list of alternatives that you would like to eat more of and celebrate yourself every time you make those positive choices.

No: Unattainable goals

Unattainable resolutions are the ones we pick at our most ambitious. “Go big” seems like solid advice, because even if we don’t quite make it, we’ll still be further along than we would have been otherwise. But research has shown that the pursuit of the unfeasible is a big source of emotional distress. We choose these goals because we underestimate the obstacles our future selves have to deal with: physical or cognitive decline, personal and professional commitments, plus those inevitable but unpredictable life events that knock the wind out of us.

These unattainable but ambitious goals soon become a source of futility and frustration. Like avoidance goals, they eat up our willpower. Eventually, they distort the stories we tell ourselves about our abilities, making us believe, for example, that failing to run a marathon means we are hopeless, when the two have little to do with each other.

Yes: Some better options

This doesn’t mean you can’t set big goals for yourself! We just want you to approach them in ways that will not demoralize you. To do this, you can first break them down into more manageable (and measurable!) pieces. Forget the marathon (for now); how about committing to running three times a week? Or even twice a week. Or once! When the marathon becomes a realistic possibility, you will know.

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Second (and this one is really important), give yourself permission to let go. It’s not unusual to resolve to do something that seems very achievable in January, only for life to get in the way in February. Stepping away from unattainable goals has been shown to reduce life stress and alleviate depression. So let it go – it’s fine.

To make the most of whatever you resolve, we strongly encourage you to write it down on paper. Putting goals in writing increases the likelihood that you will achieve them and activates brain processes involved in memory and learning, which supports follow-through. If you really want to amp up your resolutions, tell someone about them. Sharing your goals with others increases your desire to pursue them and gets you extra support along the way.

January has a way of making us feel like everything needs to change at once. But happier resolutions aren’t about dramatic transformations; they’re about intentional and thoughtful shifts. When we set resolutions with happiness in mind, success isn’t measured by perfection or intensity; it's measured by whether our goals make our lives feel richer and more satisfying.