Every year, the vast majority of us make a few unlikely and unachievable New Years Resolutions.

‘I’m going to get fit.’

‘I’m going to lose weight.’

For those of you who can brag, ‘actually, I did exactly what I said I would’ good on you, but for the majority, unfortunately it does not happen. Dont get me wrong, there are good intentions there but people don’t really think their plans through properly and end up giving up on their objectives by around mid February, which is why this article is aimed to give people a little bit of guidance for 2012.

Think SMART when choosing your objectives. Be specific. Make your objectives measurable, attainable and realistic. Finally, ensure that they are time-bound.

Having the objective of ‘getting fit’ is not being specific. How about, ‘I want to run a long distance race.’

Be measurable – how far do you want to run? ‘I want to run a half marathon.’

Is this attainable – can I run that far? ‘I’ve never run before but with consistent jogging, two to three times a week, I can run a 10 km race and we’ll see after that.’

Be realistic – are you really going to jog, two to three times per week? I think so, you should find that relatively easy to commit to. You can either run before work or after work, run at lunchtime or choose weekends instead.

Set a time-limit – when is the half marathon? Or look at entering into a 10 km race say around March time. This will give you plenty of time to train and at the same time because the deadline is not so far away, it should keep you motivated.

One final tip – whatever your objectives are, tell other people. Once you do that, it makes it very difficult to talk yourself out of it, as others are expecting you to achieve your objectives. It just puts that little bit of expectation on yourself which is a very good motivator to see the job through.

Good luck!