Live Long and Well with Dr. Bobby
Let's explore how you can Live Long and Well with six evidence based pillars: exercise, good sleep, proper nutrition, mind-body activities, exposure to heat/cold, and social relationships. I am a physician scientist, Ironman Triathlete, and have a passion for helping others achieve their best self.
Live Long and Well with Dr. Bobby
#26: New Year’s Resolutions That Work: Personalization and Evidence-Based Strategies
Take the Health Type Quiz
Do you want 2025 to finally be the year you set and achieve your New Year's Resolutions? Want to avoid the traps and pitfalls that keep most people from the finish line?
In this episode, I will discuss effective strategies for setting and achieving New Year's resolutions, particularly focusing on health-related goals but can be used in any important area of life. I will present to you a six-step approach that includes assessing one's baseline, developing focus areas, setting specific and positive goals, building support systems, and refining resolutions as needed.
This episode will give you a chance to personalize these strategies and are research backed so you'll get the best of both worlds to achieve your goals this year. Below the time stamps are a detailed explanation of each step so you can follow along and listen at the same time.
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Step 1: Assess Your Baseline: Holistically assess and reflect on your life. Take your time here as it will make a huge difference in the later steps. Below are some examples and guidelines for this step.
- How are you doing with the 6 pillars: Exercise, Sleep, Nutrition, Mind-Body Harmony, Exposure to Heat/Cold, and Social Relationships
- Assess Your Risk Factor Profile: Metrics including blood pressure, smoking, weight, diabetes, alcohol consumption.
- Preventive Care: getting screening/vaccines.
- Health Type: Knowing your health type and personalizing this process to you.
Step 2: Develop A List of Possible Areas: Make this list as long as you want as we will prioritize and shorten in an upcoming step.
Step 3: Set Your Goals/Resolutions: Set a small number of the most important goals to you on your list and create them in a positive light with additions to your life rather than negatives to stop.
Step 4: Create Your N of 1 Monitoring Approach: Measure your baseline, start the intervention, and measure progress.
Step 5: Build Your Infrastructure of Support: Get support both from external factors (trainers, friends, etc) along with internal habits and tracking.
Step 6: Refine As Needed: You'll probably find you will need to make adjustments along the way and not only is that completely okay but that is expected.
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Research Mentioned In Episode:
1. New Year's Resolution Marist Poll
2. UK New Year's Study
3. Swedish New Year's Study
4. Health As #1 Intended Resolution
5. Gym Membership Lapse Statistic
6. 2 Year New Year's Resolution Study
7. Resolutions vs No Resolutions Study
8. Positive vs Negative Resolution Study
9. Concern For Others Scoring
10. Refining Resolutions and Slips
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Work with Dr. Bobby: https:
Most resolutions fail and that's why I put together this episode, so hopefully we can all do better. Many people say I'm going to join the gym. Well, 80% of gym memberships lapse within the first five months. Even though it's six months, 46% of people are still at it, or only 46% are still at it. People are still at it or only 46% are still at it, compared to people who don't have resolutions but are also interested in similar goals. Only 8% of them are following those goals.
Speaker 1:Hi, I'm Dr Bobby Du Bois and welcome to Live Long and Well, a podcast where we will talk about what you can do to live as long as possible and with as much energy and vigor that you wish. Together, we will explore what practical and evidence-supported steps you can take. Come join me on this very important journey and I hope that you feel empowered along the way. I'm a physician, ironman triathlete and have published several hundred scientific studies. I'm honored to be your guide, to be your guide. Welcome to episode 26, new Year's resolutions that work, with personalization and evidence-based strategies.
Speaker 1:Well, it's that time of year where New Year's resolutions are in the air. Sadly, most of them fail. Now I've been reflecting which often happens this time of year and wondered is there a more successful approach, more evidence-based? After looking at the evidence and thinking about this really complex problem, I'd like to share with you an approach to New Year's resolutions based upon six steps. One assess your baseline. Two, develop possible areas to pursue and then prioritize them. Three set the actual goals and we'll talk specifically how those goals might look. Four, define your monitoring or your end-of-one approach. Five, build an infrastructure to support you. And six refine as needed. Now I put this together as a way that would be more likely that I might succeed with my 2025 resolutions, but I'm hoping this might also be useful for you.
Speaker 1:Now, this is the beginning of January. You might think, oh no, I've missed my window of opportunity. No, you're perfect. Window of opportunity. No, you're perfect. Perhaps spend January getting ready, going through these six steps and then kicking it off formally February 1st. No need to start January 1st, but having a date on the calendar when you begin is actually, from a scientific standpoint, very helpful. If you need help, a couple of options here for you. The show notes will have these six steps in it and some detail. If you want more detail, I will be writing a blog. It'll be on my website should be available when this goes live and it will have the six steps and the sub steps and that might give you some more detail, and my website is drbobblivelongandwellcom. Or, if you need more direct help, want to work with me again on my website, there's some options for how you might do that.
Speaker 1:Well, let's begin, as I always do, with my story Now. I shared some of my story a couple of episodes ago, and that was my Thanksgiving experience, where I drank more than I expected alcohol that is that led to eating more than I had hoped, getting poor sleep, waking up the next morning, getting poor sleep, waking up the next morning having coffee, and, because I had 25 family members in and lots of social situations, started that whole cycle again the next day and had four days that were not ideal for my health, and I learned what my trigger was, which is social situations, and so, as I've talked about before, that was a kind of a reflective moment and I realized that I had stopped doing some of my saunas and my regular meditation, and so I needed to restart them and I started to feel better soon after that. So, in getting ready for 2025, I thought, well, I need to focus on those, but there may be other things that I need to work on as well, and upon reflection, I thought well, I need to focus on those, but there may be other things that I need to work on as well, and upon reflection, of course there were. Now, although a huge number of people do New Year's resolutions, there's very little scientific literature, and I scoured the literature to see what do we know. Now there's a much broader literature on how do you change behavior and personal behavior, and so I'm drawing upon that as well.
Speaker 1:Well, not surprisingly, new Year's resolutions are really common. So, in the United States, about 44% of us do a New Year's resolution. 74% of us do a New Year's resolution. Now, what's fascinating is, if you look at other countries, 74% 50% more than us of folks in the UK are envisioned doing New Year's resolutions in 2025. Why are there more in the UK than the US? I don't know. Well, in the other direction, sweden, only 12 to 18% do New Year's resolutions. Again, are they so happy with their life that they don't need to do them? I don't know. There's also an age difference in New Year's resolutions. People who are in their 20s are 49% likely to develop or do New Year's resolutions, but people above age 50, only 21%. Twice as likely if you're in that young age group.
Speaker 1:Now, if you look at the surveys that have been done on New Year's resolutions, done on New Year's resolutions, health is by far and away the number one area in New Year's resolutions. It could be losing weight, it could be exercising more, stop smoking, improving one's health more generally. If you add those all up, you get 60 to 80% of all New Year's resolutions are health related. Now, as I said at the outset, most resolutions fail and that's why I put together this episode, so hopefully we can all do better. Now, what are some examples, some data that most fail? As I said, number one is health. Many people say I'm going to join the gym. Number one is health. Many people say I'm going to join the gym. Well, 80% of gym memberships lapse within the first five months. So that's a kind of evidence that most New Year's resolutions don't continue.
Speaker 1:Really interesting study. Again, there weren't a lot of studies of New Year's resolutions, but this one looked at 200 people and followed them for two years to see what happened. Well, at week one, 77% of people were working on their New Year's resolution. Of course, that means over 20% had already given up in the first week, but 77% were added at week one. By the time they followed them out two years only 19% were still focused on that issue, and I doubt that's because they solved the problem. I'm guessing that they sort of ran out of gas in the process, as most of us tend to do. Now I want to leave you with a more positive statistic than just that one. Even though it's six months, 46% of people are still at it, or only 46% are still at it. Compared to people who don't have resolutions but are also interested in similar goals, only 8% of them are following those goals. Although resolutions often fail, they're much better than not having anything at all.
Speaker 1:All right, enough of background. Let's get into the six steps Now. Let me point out that I'm talking about I'm focusing upon New Year's resolutions that relate to health, and again, those are the most common. But you may have non-health ones as well. You may have ones that relate to your career, that might relate to relationships in your life. I'm not focused on those right now, but for all the reasons I'm about to walk through, the same six steps might be useful for these other ones as well. So keep that in mind and ultimately you'll need to bring them all together.
Speaker 1:Okay, step number one assess your baseline. I suspect most of us don't spend enough time taking stock of where are we at the beginning of 2025. I know I've spent a lot of time thinking about this. There are seven aspects of our lives that I think are worth reflecting upon. That's why I'm saying spend January getting ready and kick things off February 1st. If you jump too quickly to these are my New Year's resolutions with how going through the steps might not be ideal, all right. So what are the seven areas of baseline?
Speaker 1:First, your pillars. How are you doing on the six pillars to live long and well? Where are you with your exercise program, your aerobic, your anaerobic, your strength, your balance and such? How is your sleep? Is this an area that you would like to work on in 2025? How about your nutrition and your weight? Where is that relative to where you want it to be? How about mind-body harmony? Do you have a breath practice or a meditation practice or yoga? How about exposure to saunas and cold plunges? Is that part of your routine? Is that something you want to consider? And lastly, social relationships when are you? Where would you like to be? Okay, where do I net out on the six pillars? For many of them, I'm doing okay and yes, I do have to work on my meditation practice and my need to make sure that I am doing my sauna and cold plunge. But for 2025, I particularly want to focus on my strength. As I may have mentioned once before, I did a DEXA scan and I've tested my left leg and my right leg, and my left leg is significantly weaker than my right leg and has less muscle. So this is something I definitely want to focus on of my pillars 2025. And I want to maintain my endurance ability and my ability to work on the ranch. So there's another Ironman in my 2025 future. Okay.
Speaker 1:Risk factors, second area of baseline when are you with some of the classic cardiovascular cognitive decline risk factors? Where's your blood pressure? Are you smoking? How is your weight? Do you have any evidence of diabetes or metabolic syndrome? Alcohol intake Now for me, I'm on medication for my blood pressure. I'm on medication for my cholesterol. Both of those are under control. There's some question about my eye pressure, my intraocular pressure, which is borderline, getting high. So, as a risk factor, definitely something I'm going to focus on in 2025. And I think I have a plan already for that. And alcohol I am under my sort of six or seven glasses a week, so I'm good there. No new effort needed, okay.
Speaker 1:Third area of your baseline what about your preventive care activities? Are you getting screening colonoscopy, pap smears, mammograms, the like? How about your vaccines? A lot of talk about flu vaccines and the like, but what about your tetanus? Vaccination needs to be done every 10 years, so take stock of that and that might need to be part of your New Year's resolutions. Are there any illnesses that you have that you want to get under control a little bit further? And finally, any other health issues or health-related issues that add into the mix.
Speaker 1:My dear wife, gail, pointed out to me the other day that I was acting a little bit peevish or irritable, and that happens for me when I'm very focused internally my stuff, what's going on inside of me and I'm not as outwardly focused on others and thinking about and helping others as I would like to be Now. That happens when I don't feel like I have enough energy. Now it's not physical energy, it's emotional energy and my reservoir of emotional kind of ability falls, and so that's something I want to add to my 2025. Okay, next aspect of our baseline as I said, there's a lot of things to consider your health type your health type sets the stage for the types of resolutions that might be effective. Okay, so I'm a holistic health hacker. I'm dialing in all sorts of things related to my health. As I think about 2025, I already got a lot of things. I'm focuseding in all sorts of things related to my health. As I think about 2025, I already got a lot of things I'm focused on as a holistic health hacker. It gets overwhelming, gets tiring, especially as we get older, when things don't continue to improve. So for me, if I'm going to add new things, I might need to think about dropping some. Okay.
Speaker 1:Next, single-minded achiever Well, you're really good at one area of your life, but are you open to broadening it? Maybe you need a breath practice or consider sauna for the year. Purposeful path planners you know they are good at planning stuff, but sometimes get stuck and can't decide what to do. I'm hoping that these six steps will ultimately help you and for my contentment creators. I love my contentment creators. You know health has to fit into your life and it may be. You're happy with your life and maybe you're not going to add much to it from a New Year's resolution standpoint and you have to decide for yourself. The last of the baseline elements is to take stock of what has worked and hasn't worked in the past for you.
Speaker 1:As I've said before, I have struggled with doing a strength training programming and doing that routinely. Well, a year or so ago I got a trainer she arrives every week and it's sort of out of my control and I am happy to say I at least do once a week of strength training because I found that worked for me. For my alcohol intake I have reduced that, but I didn't do it in a way of saying, nope, you can't have any more alcohol or you can't have more than X number of drinks a week. I gave myself permission to enjoy a whiskey, a wine, a beer, but I put guardrails around it. I drink once or twice a week and I drink one or two drinks at a time, so that totals maybe four or five drinks a week at most. That worked for me, rather than saying I can't do this and I have to limit the whole week to something I gave myself permission. That seems to work for me.
Speaker 1:My high intensity exercise training is I have shared. I hate it, I hate it, I hate it and I haven't succeeded there up until now. So whatever I've been doing probably is not something I should continue. I should come up with a new approach to this and I do really well when I set a date on a calendar. So I'm going to do an Ironman triathlon in 2025. I do well when I set a date on the calendar and I can work towards it. Okay, so that's the baseline. That's the hardest, longest step to do, but so important, and I suspect folks haven't tended to focus on this in the past.
Speaker 1:Okay, number two after reflecting on your baseline, develop a list of possible areas to focus on Now. This may be quite long. You may have five or 10 or 15 or more areas that you'd like to focus on. Great, get a nice long list and, as we'll talk about later, you want to narrow that list. Prioritize that list to maybe one, two or three, but start with a long list. So for me, my list, as I mentioned, one of which is going to be work on my leg asymmetry strengthen my left leg a lot more. I need to, secondly, build an energy reservoir, that's the emotional energy, so I can focus more on others, and that's going to relate, as we'll talk about my meditation practice, my sauna practice and, lastly, I want to maintain my endurance, and so there's going to be elements related to that in my resolutions.
Speaker 1:Okay, set resolutions, your new year's resolutions or, in this case, maybe your February 1st resolutions, and again, you can start any time of year. If you've just listened to this podcast in May, then get started in June. All good, no-transcript, one resolution, maybe two, maybe three, but not a lot more than that. You really want to have a small number, and the scientific studies that have been done show that to be effective, more effective. Secondly, when you're putting together your New Year's resolutions, frame them in positive ways, not negative ways. It means things you're going to do not focus on things you're going to stop. So if your New Year's resolutions in years past that didn't succeed were things like I'm going to eat fewer sweets, turn that around this year to I'm going to eat more fruits and vegetables. If you eat more fruits and vegetables, you may well reduce the amount of sweets.
Speaker 1:Positive ones have more impact than negative ones. You might have said in the past don't be a couch potato in 2025. Phrase it in a more positive way. I'm going to do a daily walk around the block for 15 minutes. So again, you're framing it in a positive way. Now, this isn't just Bobby's belief, or Bobby's belief talking to some people. There was a randomized control trial on this issue of positive resolutions versus negative ones, and there were a thousand people. If it was a negatively phrased one, only 47% of people were able to do it at the end of a year, but that jumped up to 59% of people succeeded if it was framed in a more positive way. So do keep that in mind, okay.
Speaker 1:Next element in developing your resolutions be specific. Resolutions like exercise more, lose weight, get more sleep don't do nearly as well as ones that are more precise. So, if you want more sleep, frame it specifically as I'm going to go to bed between 9.30 and 10 at night. I'm going to take a morning walk five days a week, not seven days a week If you do it, great, but make it precise. And as we'll talk about something that's succeedable, something specific like I'm going to do a 5k walk or run, or I'm going to track my calorie intake not reduce it, but track my calorie intake for a month. So for me, 2025, I'm going to increase my strength training from once a week to twice a week, and that second one is going to emphasize single leg work like squats and other kinds of things. So very specific, something I'm going to do for my energy reservoir, not feeling peevish, feeling more outwardly focused on others. I'm going to do a meditation practice four times a week and my sauna or steam or cold plunge I'm going to do that three times a week. So very precise things that are more likely to succeed for me and I hope if you take that approach for you. Okay, the last one in defining them, make them incremental, not lofty resolutions, and also maybe make them near term, or at least the first set near term, maybe a month. Give yourself some early wins, chances to succeed, because that will keep you going. And, as I said for me in the first month, I'll know whether I'm on the right track by seeing whether I'm doing another strength session focused on a single leg each week.
Speaker 1:Okay, number four of our six steps to develop New Year's resolutions, this one won't come as a surprise. I'm a data person. I love the N of one monitoring approach. What does that mean it's a way for you to keep track of your resolutions and seeing if you're moving in the right direction. So we're going to choose a way to measure where you are at the beginning. You're going to start that intervention and you're going to measure progress, all right.
Speaker 1:So what am I going to do? So sleep is one of my proxies for energy. So I'm going to use my aura ring and I'm going to monitor my sleep, sleep efficiency, various numbers that come out, and I'll use that as a proxy. If I get good sleep, higher numbers likely my energy level will be commensurate and I'll be feeling better and able to think outwardly about others. Okay, what about my left leg weakness or the strength I want to improve? Well, subjectively, I'll know. Am I increasing weight on that? Is that something I'm able to do? But also, in three to four months, I'll do another DEXA scan which will objectively show where was I at the baseline and how has that intervention worked. So for you, you can do that. Am I hourly focused? I'm going to do a weekly assessment.
Speaker 1:Now, I didn't know how am I going to assess whether I'm thinking and caring about others more than I was in the past? Well, I went on the web, looked around and there's actually a questionnaire just for this. It's called the Concern. For Others it's a simple 10-question questionnaire. Take me about two minutes and for you, I don't know what your area of focus, but do find a way to monitor it in an objective way that will keep you on track. Okay, the number five step in our resolutions build infrastructure of support, both internal to yourself and that motivation may come through things like questionnaires or doing certain tests that can assess where you are and external, now, support systems.
Speaker 1:The evidence here is a bit more mixed. I would have thought that having others help you in this regard would clearly be positive. Well, some studies they are, but in other studies they're not. But here's some thoughts to consider. If getting to the gym or doing your daily walk is challenging and it's hard to keep doing it, maybe have a friend join you at the gym, or your partner for a walk, or somebody down the block, or maybe your dog. Your dog will keep you company. How about an accountability buddy, somebody that you share your resolutions with? They share with you and you might find that's a helpful way. Maybe it's a journal you keep track of, a calendar, a log, a spreadsheet.
Speaker 1:Depending upon your health type, different things might work for you. Well, what about for me? My infrastructure of support is my trainer is going to continue to come once a week and I will get that once a week session. As a holistic health hacker trying to dial in everything. If I'm going to add more things to my plate, I'm going to probably take some off and I'm going to give myself grace because I do push myself quite hard, and so what I need, as a holistic health hacker, for my support is to give myself grace, and I'm also involved in a men's team which gives me accountability and support, because I will share these with my team. They'll ask and I will share how I'm doing moving forward.
Speaker 1:Okay, the all-important final step six refine your resolutions as needed. Slips happen. Slips are going to happen. In a study that looked at how often people kind of slipped up on doing their resolutions, 53% of them had at least one slip in the observation period of a year or two. The average number of slips is 14. You've got to restart. Don't give up. Keep at it. If you need to take a break for a couple weeks, fine, choose the first of the next month to get started again, as I've said to you, I stopped my meditation, I stopped my sauna. I needed to restart. I've already had to do that for Thanksgiving and I'm going to recharge myself to do it during the early parts of 2025. Okay, time to wrap up.
Speaker 1:Resolutions often fail, but they don't need to fail. There are some people who are able to keep them and I hope the six steps may be more successful for you. Again, those six steps are assess your baseline. Many different ways you need to do that. Develop a long list of possibilities that you might focus on, but then narrow it to a small number. Set your goals a small number, very specific, in positive words. Define your monitoring plan or your end of one plan. Build your infrastructure and finally refine as needed. Give yourself time to do this right. Work on this in January and then kick things off perhaps February 1st.
Speaker 1:Well, I don't have a health coach, but in some ways, you my audience are my health coach. You are going to be my reality check and my motivation, and I'll share how I'm doing with you. If you need a health coach or you need some help, by all means, if you're interested in working with me, I have several programs. Just check out the website. And that's drbobbylivelongandwellcom. The website. And that's drbobbylivelongandwellcom. Well, 2025 is upon us and I hope your New Year's resolutions set you on a great path to live long and well. Thanks so much for listening to Live Long and Well with Dr Bobby. If you liked this episode, please provide a review on Apple or Spotify or wherever you listen. If you want to continue this journey or want to receive my newsletter on practical and scientific ways to improve your health and longevity, please visit me at drbobblivelongandwellcom. That's doctor, as in D-R Bobby, live long and wellcom.