Best Year Ever

Living with spasmodic dysphonia (SD) can impact all areas of your life.  We would like to encourage you to use this new year as a new beginning.  By assessing each area of your life and creating a plan to impact each area can help create a more positive outlook on living with SD.  That’s why we are sharing a simple worksheet on building a new year’s resolution that centers around enhancing your life as it relates to SD. Download it here.  

But let’s be honest.  New year’s resolutions often go to the wayside once life gets in the way.  In fact, one stat says that says that 80% of those who make a resolution will have given up by the first week of February.  Since we want you to have a great 2019, we decided to scour the Internet for advice on how to make and keep those resolutions.

Billionaire Richard Branson writes down his resolutions.  Whether on paper or in your phone, the act of documenting a resolution helps it stick better then thinking it.  Include short and longer term goals and then check them off when completed.  It’s important to celebrate the little wins and feel that sense of accomplishment.

Tony Robbins, a business and life coach, goes a step further. If you want a resolution to stick, you need to have a clear and concise plan.  It needs to include what you want to accomplish, why you want to do it, how it will be accomplished, and tools and resources that you need to make it all happen. It’s also important to review the goal every day to enhance your spirit of renewal.  

According to Popular Science Magazine, make sure your goals for 2019 are concrete enough that they can be broken down into smaller bite size pieces.   It is hard to feel accomplished when a goal is abstract.  Also, pair your new goals to something that happens automatically each day. Like maybe you do voice exercises every day while in the shower.  The act of showering every day is already a habit, so connecting the voice exercises to something you’re already in the habit of doing will help it stick.  And don’t forget to connect the completion that new daily habit with a sense of accomplishment.   Celebrate that sense of accomplishment.

Former Google career coach, Jenny Blake, offers a method of writing down your goals for the year and really pinpointing what’s important.  Check out this quick video.

According to the New York Post, resolutions present an opportunity for self-improvement. Try to set a tough goal, but provide yourself with the ability to slip up without penalty. This means that in the event that you go off course, you can get back on track and not be discouraged by the occasional slipup.

And finally, here’s some advice from us.  No matter what happens to your resolutions, remember, you’re wonderful just the way you are.