Are your new year’s resolutions poorly sheltered by mixed or half-hearted convictions? Or, are they shielded from life’s “wolves”—supported with reserves of stability, strength, and peace? Learn here how to nourish your goals, so you can flourish in the new year.

I know there’s a whole heap of guidance about making and keeping resolutions already out there.

Many articles will tell you to pick realistic goals, to be specific and to write them down. Others will encourage you to pair up with people who will support you in your goals, to reward yourself, and to not get discouraged if you slip up or lose your motivation temporarily.

These are all fine recommendations. So, why add another post to the fray stating more of the same?

Well, what I’m about to discuss has less to do with the nature of your goals or their execution and more to do with the spirit in which you make your resolutions this year. The feelings that fuel your goal-setting will make or break your progress, and it will also impact what the process feels like for you. A year is a long time, and resolutions are often about important matters, so it’s important for that these come from a good place and are adequately nourished with strong convictions and good feelings.

So, today we are going to talk about how to summon loving change in your life—how to construct a shelter that will keep wolves at bay, so that you can have a fair chance at the fresh year ahead of you.

Let’s talk about building materials that you will want to invest in or use sparingly when developing your ambitions in the new year. After all, we want your goals to be motivated by feelings that are effective, not destructive.

Pig 1: Guilt

This piggy locks the door and holes up in the house, but has nothing to eat in the pantry. The wolf outwaits him, and he eventually starves or surrenders.

Goals motivated exclusively or primarily by guilty feelings or a desire to avoid guilt will likely fail in the long run. This position is simply too exhausting to hold for long periods of time without having adverse consequences on one’s self-esteem and willpower.

Guilt can be really unforgiving of mistakes, too. These feelings can trigger the “what-the-hell” effect—a sort of rationalization that happens when feeling fatigued or discouraged in one’s efforts to stay the course. It’s especially common after making a “slip” or breaking a personal goal or rule. This permission-giving can snowball into binge behavior—whether it’s with eating, drinking, or shopping. Similarly, it can halt progress in its tracks—exercise regimens or healthy meal planning can be cast aside because of a single mistake.

Sadly, guilt gets a bad rap a lot of the time.

In small doses, guilt can be a healthy and appropriate reaction and can prevent you from making poor or impulsive choices. But, setting goals that emerge primarily out of this feeling will erode at your confidence and poison your progress. There are some great discussions online that differentiate between healthy feelings of guilt and inappropriate manifestations of this common emotion. I’ll post some links at the end of this post if you’d like to read more about it.

Recommendation: Use sparingly. Check whether the guilt is coming from a healthy place—does it spur you to make reparations, redouble your efforts, or check your agenda? Or, does it stop you in your tracks, derailing your progress with criticism and self-doubt so you throw in the towel?

Pig 2: Shame

This pig will open the door and say to the wolf, “Come in and devour me. I don’t deserve to live.”

In my opinion, this is the worst of the piggies—a straw house for sure.

Healthy shame signals limitations; it puts us in touch with our fallibility and humanness. It can be a touchy and vulnerable feeling, and it can be distorted into a powerfully toxic force that can govern much of our emotional life.

Goals that are housed in shameful feelings will crumble easily, and here’s why:

Feelings of toxic shame are a thesis about being unloveable or damaged. They emerge from a false sense that something is deeply wrong or bad inside, something that must not be seen by others. Shame says, “I don’t deserve to have good things” or “I am a bad person.”

Can you imagine making positive life changes in such an emotional climate?

If you’re confused about the difference between guilt and shame, consider this: Guilt says, “I’ve done something wrong.” Shame says, “There is something wrong with me.”

There’s a lot of talk about the function of shameful feelings in our culture. Several books have been published that look at the difference between healthy and toxic shame. There isn’t room in this post to address this specifically, so let’s just make the abbreviated point here that shame, like guilt, can have tricky underpinnings and should be handled with care.

Recommendation: Avoid this one if you can. If you need help combating strong feelings of shame, consider talking it over with a therapist. This will help with a lot more than just your new year’s resolutions.

Pig 3: Love

This piggy tends to his brick house with affection. His larder is full, and he sits by the fire quite comfortably until the wolf gets tired and leaves.

Convictions that emerge from a place of love and acceptance will last. There’s loads of compassion, patience, and permission when life happens and things go awry. These feelings produce a kind of “slow burn” of goodwill that will foster happy habits that last after other, more painful motivators have burned out or collapsed.

We see all sorts of shows on TV that suggest that powerful feelings of shame and guilt can propel people into action—and this is true. But many times, these efforts crater under the heavy burden of toxicity and high pressure over time.

If you know that you’re good and loveable just as you are, you might think that this would remove the motivation to change, right? In my experience as a therapist, the opposite is often true in my practice.  When people feel fully accepted and safe, free of guilt or shame, they are then able to change.  I think psychologist Carl Rogers said it best:

“The curious paradox is that when I accept myself just as I am, then I can change.”

Recommendation: Get as much of this as you can, and surround yourself with people who can share their love and good energy with you as you tackle your goals.

Starve the wolf

Don’t be an easy meal for the wolf this year. Fortify yourself with a spirit of stewardship and love for your body, mind, and heart.  I think that you will find that it is easier to make lasting changes from a place of acceptance and love rather than censure or criticism.

More reading:

You can learn more about healthy versus toxic shame and guilt here, here, and here.

More on the “what-the-hell” effect.