209. A New Spin on Your New Year Resolution (Transforming Resolutions into Meaningful Intentions)

The New Year often brings a wave of resolutions and aspirations, but it can also lead to feelings of pressure and disappointment. 

In this enlightening episode of Health Bite, Dr. Adrienne Youdim offers a fresh perspective on New Year's resolutions, encouraging listeners to focus on mindset shifts that promote sustainable growth and well-being.

Join Dr. Adrienne Youdim as she discusses how to approach the new year with intention, mindfulness, and self-compassion, rather than the typical pressure of resolutions.

What You'll Learn From This Episode:

• The psychological phenomena behind New Year's resolutions and why many fail
• How to cultivate a sense of ease and peace in the present moment
• Strategies for holding your aspirations with intention, like holding an egg
• The inevitability of failure and how to build resilience through self-compassion
• Practical tips for redirecting negative thoughts and embracing mindfulness

"Hold your aspirations like an egg—with intention but not force." — Dr. Adrienne Youdim

Ways that Dr. Adrienne Youdim Can Support You

1. Join the Monthly Free Mind-Body Workshops: Participate in engaging mind-body practices designed to help manage your stress response. Register here.
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3. Freebie alert. Register for our monthly free MindBody Workshop and receive a downloadable guide on emotional labeling to help you manage your emotions effectively.

Connect with Dr. Adrienne Youdim

• Website :https://www.dradriennespeaks.com/
• Instagram: https://www.instagram.com/dradrienneyoudim/

Transcript

Welcome to the first episode of 2025 for the HealthBite podcast and happy new year! I hope you all had a joyful holiday season and are feeling refreshed and ready for the new year. Regardless, we are here for you with a bunch of new content to nourish you mind, body and soul. 

We talk alot about habit change and mindset on this podcast and 

Since it is the first episode of the new year, I am going to have to address the resolutions but as always I will offer you a new spin, perhaps something you have not considered like how to resolve not to and how to hold your aspirations like an egg.

So stay tuned for a fresh spin on your new year’s resolution.

Welcome to HealthBite, the podcast where I offer small actionable bites to greater physical, mental and emotional health and wellbeing. 

I'm your host Dr Adrienne Youdim. I am triple board certified an internist, obesity medicine and physician nutrition specialist and I have learned in working with patients and clients for nearly 20 years, that good nutrition is not just about the food that you eat, but all the ways in which we can nourish ourselves physically, mentally and emotionally. Together we will explore the intersection of science, nutrition, health and wellbeing in the pursuit of living well. These quick bites will leave you feeling motivated, empowered and inspired.

First off lets talk about the resolution and Im not sure if you noticed but as I shared in my newsletter last week, it feels like there been less “resolution talk” this year? As if resolutions have become kind of passé  To which I would say that perhaps we are finally onto something, because the research has shown that only 9% of Americans keep their resolutions each year. But to say that resolutions just dont work is not totally correct either because there is also a psychological phenomenon of starting something new. And there is actually a term for that like the shiny-new thing effect but im not a psychologist so I dont know. 

Basically tho, there is a certain motivation that comes with the new year or a new month or a new week, even with a new pair of tennis shoes. SO the question is how can we capitalize on the energy of the new year in a way that is durable and sustainable. 

And the first thing I want to encourage you to do is to have a mindset shift as you think of the new year. Instead of thinking of how you want to change, or how you want to be in the future or what you wish to accomplish, I want you to focus on how you can feel right now in the present moment. Forget future. Focus on right now. 

For example- if you want to feel more at ease, some say feel happy, but I want to say peace or ease, because being happy, giggly or jovial may feel contrived for some and I'm not here to force toxic positivity. So let's just stay with feeling at ease in the present moment. Plant the seeds that make you feel at ease. For example, if your mind lands on a negative thought I’m not x enough ( alot of our new years resolutions are about this, Im not thin enough, fit enough, healthy enough, rich enough, educated enough, in enough relationship) I want you to CHOOSE not to nurture that negative thought. Chose to let the thought go. We have a negativity bias. Our brains are constantly scanning the environment for threat, for the negative, in order to keep us safe. But when we do this repeatedly as we do and cultivate this way of being- by ruminating and thinking it over and over and over again, we create a habit. So just stop. It is that simple. When you start going into this loop of thinking, just stop and focus on something else. Focus on your breath, focus on the feeling of your feet on the ground, focus on the sounds around you, go outside and notice the tress or birds around you. Literally get into the habit of redirecting your attention from the negative, to the present. I know this might sound nuts to alot of you but trust me, if you give into this notion and go with it, without resistance, it is a really effective way to retrain your mind. In essence it is mindfulness. Notice the thought, let it go and bring yourself, quite concretely to the present moment. 

The second is to savor. Yes there is alot that you dont have or that you may wish to have or achieve but what about what you do have, what you have achieved. Savor that. Its easy to make it to the end of the year and forget all that you have done. So consider creating a jar where you place a daily note of something that went well, a small win a meaningful interaction a yummy meal or a cute puppy you saw on the street. My daughter does a one second a day app, basically you record one second a day on your phone and upload it to an app. At the end of the year you get a montage under 10 minutes of all the little joys throughout the year. She has done it for several years now and it is such a sweet way to remember all the good throughout the year. Or you can do what I do. I bought a small moleskin journal. I keep it in my purse or at my bed stand commit to record just one thing daily. We tend to focus on the big things in life- weddings, promotions, vacations - those are all great - but research shows that we cultivate joy when we savor the little things. 

Alright but I know what you are thinking. What about growth?. I mean if we don't grow we remain stagnant and thats not what anyone wants. Arnt goals and aspirations a part of a meaningful and fulfilling life. My answer is yes. But we also run the risk of being so committed to our goals and so desirous of the outcome that we ruin our time on the journey. I mean wouldn't you agree that all the worrying and fretting we do about the future all the wanting and striving ruins our present moment and the ability to feel joy in the journey? Again, I know that this may evoke an eye roll from some of you but then again ask yourself, is this the point of life, to be so fixated on our future state that we make ourselves miserable in the process?  

And to that end I have an analogy. It's not surprising given what I do that it is a food analogy. Hold your aspirations like an egg. What I mean is if you cling too tightly you will squash the egg, if you hold it too loosely the egg will slip though your fingers. So hold your aspirations like an egg. With intention but not with force. Does that make sense? 

Third, find your why? I recently spoke with a patient who said he just did not like exericse. Like he was never that guy that felt the crazy endorphins or exercise high. But when we leaned into it a bit he admitted that when he did life weights he felt strong and he liked feeling strong in his body. Okay then, do it because you like to feel strong. We have this funny expectation that everything should make us feel glee. As if kicks and giggles are the only feeling or experience worth working towards. Really? There is a whole range of valuable feelings and experiences out there and feeling strong in your body is one of them. So ask yourself why? May you are looking for vitality, autonomy, agency, self assured, confident. These are some of the may reasons that you may want to eat, exercise, take a course, save money or any other of your resolutions.

Ok last but not least be willing to fail. First of all, failure is inevitable. But it does not need to mean the end game. If you are willing to fail, then you will be rewarded with resilience. Because every time you fail, or fall off the wagon or whatever euphemism you want to use. And then after you cry, you get up, dust yourself off and move on, ou build resilience to anything that might get in your way. And that resilience, that grit is as Angela Duckworths research shows the single factor that determines success. Not intellect, money, good looks, a good family pedigree - just grit. 

Ok and last last thing because this must be said. Be compassionate. As I have said numerous times on this podcast, self compassion is critical to successful habit change. Because failures,and limitations are human. As much as we wish otherwise, no one always succeeds and therefore we must have a way to deal with our setbacks in a way that is enabling not crushing. And that thing is self compassion. And as I said we have discussed this to a great degree on this podcast so feel free to scroll back to past episodes for more but in a nutshell, a self compassion practice entails these three things. 1. Have compassion for yourself meaning when you are faced with your limitations, be kind not judgemental. Be kind, be nice to yourself, just as you would to your friend or to a child. 2. Recognize our common humanity. We all…. and 3 don't overidentify with the failure, you may have experienced a set back but you are not the setback, you are not the failure. 

I hope that you can recognize that the ability to resolve to a goal has so much less to do with the goal itself and so much more with the mindset with which you go about that goal. Trust me, I have been doing this work as a weight loss physician for nearly 20 years. I have worked with thousands of humans. And time and time again I have come to this conclusion - all the medications, diets, tips tricks that promise change are futile if we dont do the work to change the mindset that sabotages us. And we can use this example with food and our weight and extrapolate it to anything that we desire or wrestle with on our lives. In my book hungry for more I give personal examples of how I have used this very concept with my clients and in my own life weather we are talking about our health or our personal relationships, professional goals or even the deeper things in our lives. 

I hope you enjoyed this episode and my offer for a fresh spin on your new year’s resolution. As I mentioned I absolutely love the science and practice of living well and I have tons of resources for you- book, newsletter, podcast, tedx and a mind body course that starts in less than 2 weeks for those of you who are truly committed to a transformational approach to living well!. If you are interested in any of the above head over to the show notes and sign up for my newsletter. www.