Year after year, we make New Year’s Resolutions trying to turn over a new leaf and change our lives for years to come. The most common resolutions are generally ambitious, or downright unrealistic. More often than not they are motivated by shame and self-judgment.
In psychological terms, resolutions tend to be backed by avoidant motivations, by what we don’t want, instead of approach motivations, what we do want. While this difference might seem minimal or largely semantic, it is actually extremely important in terms of what we can achieve and how. Here are some examples of common New Year’s Resolutions and how we have changed them to make them more possible and fulfilling.
Love My Body Vs. Change My Body
Let’s take weight loss as an example, this is one of the top resolutions every year. Most people vow to go on diets or begin intense workout regimens which maybe last until February or March. Why? Because changing habits is actually a pretty difficult venture and when you do it from a basis of being unkind to yourself it is very unlikely to work. What if your resolution was to think of small, daily ways to try and love your body more. This is not an easy task in a society that promotes self-hatred and unrealistic standards, but it can be done with patience and mindfulness.
So here is a reminder from us – your body is beautiful, strong, and has the potential to experience amazing amounts of pleasure. Think of a few kind things to say to your body – your body will be kind back.
Loving your body may well include exercising more and focusing on foods that make you feel good longer versus foods that fill an emotional void in the moment. But the emphasis on acceptance is much more likely to lead to change than the obsession with change. This goes for much more than body image goals, which is why we encourage people to de-shamify as an essential focus for any personal growth.
Explore My Passion vs Get a New Job
While an employment change may be in your future it can be daunting as a New Year’s Resolution. Also, sometimes simply changing jobs does not actually offer long-term satisfaction. So let’s leave this for another kind of to-do list and make the resolution to explore your passion. Finding ways to include what you are passionate about in your routines about can transform all aspects of your life. Not all passions will translate to a career, but many can even if the connection is not obvious at first. From our own career trajectories, we have learned that following our passions, even when we were not connecting them to a clear career goal, kept leading us back to gaining deeper understandings of sex and intimacy.
When people come to our Somatica Training they tell us that the changes they make as a result are not limited to romantic relationships or professional growth. Whether our students become sex and intimacy coaches and apply our method daily in their careers or simply in their relationships and personal growth, it still impacts satisfaction in all elements of their life.
Connect More vs. Make New Friends
Adults over 30 report struggling to make new friends as a major point of dissatisfaction. While the spirit of the resolution to make new friends is great, it might feel a bit overwhelming. What if instead, you resolved to connect more in general and to give yourself points just for putting yourself out there in your daily life.
This might mean making more eye contact, striking up conversations, pming a Facebook acquaintance for a coffee date or a FaceTime date with an old friend. When people join us for a Somatica Training they find a community that they only ever dreamed about before. The nature of the work means that people can’t hide behind small talk or devices, instead, they enter into an immersive experience where they get to know each other and create lasting bonds and support networks. Friendships grow organically once we come to an experience with our full selves.
Explore Your Sexual Self vs. Have More Sex
There is nothing wrong with wanting to up the frequency of your sex life. However, as sex and relationship coaches we can tell you that the way to make sustainable and highly pleasurable changes to your sex life generally involves taking some time to explore what you really want and to learn how to ask for it. This is not as simple as quality over quantity, because, the truth is, both are important.
Read more…
Ok, we like this one as it is. We are avid readers of fiction and non-fiction. Let’s face it, books are sexy. Knowledge is sexy. But once again, we are going to emphasize reading for pleasure as a New Year’s Resolution. It will be much easier to make reading a sustainable habit if you start of with your pleasure reads and cycle in that book on personal finance a bit later. We like a steady diet alternating fiction with new books in the field of sex and intimacy. This way we have something to read for whatever headspace we are in, but we love it all.
Oh, and if you have not already read our books, Making Love Real and Cockfidence we would love to know what you think.
So…what are the Best New Year’s Resolutions?
Anything that makes you smile when you think about the year ahead. We can’t wait to hear all about your New Years Resolution ideas.
Dr. Danielle Harel is the co-creator of the Somatica® Method, and the co-founder of the Somatica Institute.
As a somatic sexologist and teacher, she has devoted the last twenty years to sex coaching and empowering couples, women, men, and groups.
She is also the co-producer of the TV program Here She Comes - an episodic based on the Somatica Method that is currently in production.
Danielle has published original research on Orgasmic Birth and is the co-author of three books: Cockfidence, Making Love Real, and Coming Together.
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