My 7 Realistic New Years Resolutions

Ok so I know it is actually the 10th of January and these sorts of posts should usually go out on the 1st but before I committed to writing them down I wanted to see if they were actually possible. I mean there is nothing quite like setting yourself up to fail.

So I have decided that this year I am going to set realistic resolutions, I mean as much as I would love to lose 5 stone and go to the gym all the time that is exactly the sort of thing I would fail at. With this in mind, I have set myself 7 realistic resolutions to help me to have a better quality of life

1 – Check food labels before I eat anything

Last year I was told that I have a milk intolerance and as much as I hoped that not eating milk, cheese yoghurt and ice cream would sort me out it seems that milk is in everything! The amount of times I ate something and then thought to check afterwards is crazy. So this year it is all about checking labels and nutritional information. I mean, I am not saying I won’t eat anything with milk in because sometimes I will decide it is worth the sacrifice but at least I will be making informed decisions.

2 – Walk every day

We have a dog. A little Jackchi and seen as I work at home this means that it is my responsibility to make sure he has a walk every day. We actually plan to walk him twice a day during the week (Weather dependent) and one long walk at the weekends. This does actually mean I leave my house every day and that I don’t sit in my pyjamas until I have to do the afternoon school run so it is definitely a good thing. I have really been enjoying our walks this week and I am concentrating on training him whilst also spinning pokestops and hatching eggs on Pokemon Go. It’s a win-win situation.

3 – Turn my laptop off after work

I am awful at sitting on the sofa to work during the day and then keeping the laptop on my knee all evening. This means I end up working until really late and not really switching off. Well with the dog in the house I cant do that anymore. Sonny loves sitting on my knee when I am on the sofa and there isnt space for my laptop and the dog. It also isnt very practical. So my laptop is back on my desk where it belongs and I am shutting it down when my daily tasks are complete. The other day I even turned it off at 4:30pm, craziness! This leads me nicely to my next resolution.

4 – Set realistic daily tasks

I use Todoist to organise all of the jobs that I need to do no matter how small. I have Todoist on my phone and laptop and I can even ask Alexa to add tasks to it when I remember them. The key thing is to not place too many tasks in one day. This is something I used to struggle with because you always end up doing things that are not on your list so you have to remember to build that into your plan.  I am quite happy to move tasks to different days or even weeks if I don’t think I have the time for them. Setting realistic daily tasks means I can actually switch off at a decent time rather than work late into the evening.

5 – Reduce my procrastination time

As I have a list of daily tasks to complete, and the goal of turning my laptop off early I need to reduce my procrastination time. I have done this by only looking at my emails every hour and not having my social media channels open all the time. I am also getting good at recognising when I am on a procrastination spiral and pulling myself away from it and getting back to the tasks in hand.

6 – Go to bed at a reasonable time

My goal is to be in bed by 11pm on a weekday. This may sound late to some people but I am used to going to bed at midnight or later. By making sure I am in my bed by 11pm I will get more sleep and be able to concentrate more the next day. I have succeeded so far and will keep it up as after just a week I feel so much better.

7 – Meal plan

I am awful at opening the fridge and staring at what is inside before grabbing something unhealthy. Weekly meal planning for lunch and dinner will not only prevent this but also hopefully help me lose weight as when we plan meals we tend to plan reasonably healthy ones. Knowing what we are having for dinner each night also prevents takeaways from becoming a common occurrence which they became last year.

So there you have it 7 realistic resolutions that I hope I will be able to stick with and that will make sure that my work life balance and quality of life is much better.