Why you failed your New Year's resolution. Again.

Context shift #1

The Chole Bhature Effect

The expectations and norms that keep an individual within a collective can be stronger than the individual's need for self-improvement in collectivistic cultures. You have cut carbs and are sticking to your resolution. Then Sunday comes, guests are over, and your mother is famous for her chole bhature. You could not be a spoilsport. You had to share the table and appreciate your mother's food.

“I have to eat a lot of junk food because everyone else at work is so stressed... We get 10 minute breaks and that place only has samosa and cake. You have to eat either cake or samosa.”

Source: Why you failed your New Year's resolution. Again, 1001 Stories, PDF p. 8

Context shift #2

The Ghar-Wapsi Effect

Habits built in adopted environments break down when one goes back to their original contexts, triggering an earlier identity. A young migrant couple from Meerut, with a gym routine in Mumbai, goes home for Makar Sankranti. Ghee-rich home food and the halwai's sweets are a call to their very identity. What is resolved in Mumbai stays in Mumbai. The person you used to be in your older environment tends to switch chairs with who you are in your work or study city.

“We go to Goa [hometown] quite often. And because we are home and everyone is pampering us... we get a little lazy. It's OK, once we're back in Pune, we are very strict. I wanna stick to my resolution even when I am in Goa.”

Also written as: Ghar Wapasi Effect, Ghar Wapsi Effect

Source: Why you failed your New Year's resolution. Again, 1001 Stories, PDF p. 10

Context shift #3

The Fast-Train Effect

Picking new habits and goals without slowing down and making space for them in current life often causes failure. A new resolution requires careful consideration of how it fits in your life without disrupting other facets. Doing it often needs some slowing down, or the momentum of your own life will make you trip.

“Take up your crazy weightloss journey when you don't have too much going on. In difficult times your body just needs to survive.”

Source: Why you failed your New Year's resolution. Again, 1001 Stories, PDF p. 12

Context shift #4

The Daily Googly

Every day comes with its own set of challenges. The higher the variability in daily life, the greater the likelihood of falling off the journey. While creating three to four month resolution plans, individuals often fail to account for daily micro-variations: field-heavy jobs, unpredictable city traffic, long office hours. A highly frequent Daily Googly caused resolution-related activities to drop quickly, especially in the initial phases.

“I kind of think my day is not very structured, so for me to insert a habit it gets difficult.”

Source: Why you failed your New Year's resolution. Again, 1001 Stories, PDF p. 14

Context shift #5

Resolver's Blindspot

The resolution taker gets so focused on the fact that they are changing that they become blind to the fact that the world is constantly changing too. Related to the spotlight effect: we are far more aware of changes in ourselves than others are. If not accounted for long enough, resolutions become incompatible with life, and you drop off, blindsided by the change.

Source: Why you failed your New Year's resolution. Again, 1001 Stories, PDF p. 16

Concept

Adjacent Likeable Activity and Faux Resolutions

Adjacent likeable activities resemble the process and skills needed for the main resolution, and help train individuals for it. Faux resolutions take you further away: they do not solve the root cause or do not align with the desired future. If doom scrolling is caused by loneliness, going back to a feature phone may not help. 'Simple' depends on your starting point: for someone who wants to become a product manager but is not a reader, starting simple means reading books they like before books on PM skills.

Source: Why you failed your New Year's resolution. Again, 1001 Stories, PDF p. 22

Principle #1

Lifephase Resolutions > Lifestyle Resolutions

Across projects in healthcare, insurance and public health, 1001 Stories observed that helping people move towards a new identity created a stronger drive for action than simple motivations for a 'better life'. In a project on a nicotine replacement product for gutka chewers, users were most likely to try it after they had a girl child; they wanted to be seen as ideal fathers. Desiring a new identity triggers change. Building it towards a new life-phase consolidates it.

“We have been trying for a family for the last one year... That dream keeps me going to keep improving my body, mind and spirit so that I am ready for it.”

Also written as: Lifestage > Lifestyle, Lifestage over lifestyle, Lifephase over lifestyle

Source: Why you failed your New Year's resolution. Again, 1001 Stories, PDF p. 32

Principle #2

Fail Thrice

In 2020, 1001 Stories observed 30 individuals who wanted to be fitter, with one instruction: make every day 'non-zero'. At each stage of lapsing, roughly 30% of people dropped off. The people who learnt through failing each time and tried again were the ones who finally ran marathons or lost weight and kept it off. Facing failure is inherent to starting anew.

Source: Why you failed your New Year's resolution. Again, 1001 Stories, PDF p. 35

Principle #3

Eigenzeit

A German concept for 'the time inherent to a process'. Three-month transformation stories miss the effort, resources and precision needed. Each kind of resolution requires its own time, and rushing it adds stress and causes lapses. There is an inherent time needed for building a healthy relationship with your resolution.

Source: Why you failed your New Year's resolution. Again, 1001 Stories, PDF p. 38

Tradition

Sankalpa and festival rituals

Indian traditions ritualised these learnings. In a Sankalpa, one articulates their current state and sense of self, the place and time, and the purpose and duration of the endeavour: a highly intentional resolution that takes current state into account. Akshaya Tritiya and Dhanteras work as a yearly ritual for investing in gold. Vishwakarma Puja, Holi, Navratri and Saraswati Puja offer multiple occasions to make new attempts.

Source: Why you failed your New Year's resolution. Again, 1001 Stories, PDF p. 40

Concept

Resolution Gestation

The pre-resolution period during which individuals can work on improving their relationship with the resolution before kick-starting it. 1001 Stories found that activities before the new year itself were a better predictor of success. Those who worked on this relationship during gestation, through failing and learning, stayed more consistent by forecasting periods of failure.

Source: Why you failed your New Year's resolution. Again, 1001 Stories, PDF p. 47

Concept

The Kick-Start Effect

Discovered by 1001 Stories. An evolution of the Fresh Start Effect in which learning from past failures has been incorporated into the individual's abilities after a prolonged gestation period of the resolution. It gives individuals an edge over those who decide to 'start fresh'. The Fresh Start Effect, by contrast, is explained as people 'getting over' their past failures after a temporal landmark like a new year.

Source: Why you failed your New Year's resolution. Again, 1001 Stories, PDF p. 47

Framework

Resolution Relationship Graph

Maps a person's relationship with their resolution, from resolution as an adversary to overcome, to resolution as an ally. As the relationship line crosses the intention-to-action cut-off, intentions start translating into action. The veteran's curve crosses it; the newbie's does not.

Source: Why you failed your New Year's resolution. Again, 1001 Stories, PDF p. 46

Framework

The Resolver's Perspective Board

Resolutions as snakes and ladders. Lapses (the Chole Bhature Effect, the Daily Googly) are snakes; triggers (life-phase shifts) are ladders; every roll of the dice is an attempt. The newbie wants to keep rolling 5s and 6s, expects only ladders and sees the goal as hitting a measure. The veteran accepts 1s, 2s and 3s, expects snakes and keeps rolling, and sees the goal as building a healthy relationship with the resolution. The veteran is the same person as the newbie. It's just that they continued rolling the dice.

Source: Why you failed your New Year's resolution. Again, 1001 Stories, PDF p. 48