A majority of Americans, 82%, plan to make at least one New Year’s resolution, according to a 2026 Healthy Minds Poll released by the American Psychiatric Association this month.
Many are focusing their resolutions on physical fitness (44%), financial goals (42%) and mental health (38%).
Bestselling author and podcaster Mel Robbins has her own New Year’s tradition that helps her “change the settings in my mind,” she said on the December 15 episode of “The Mel Robbins Podcast.” It’s a ritual she’s been practicing with her husband for 22 years.
The exercise helps her both look backwards at the last 12 months and look forward toward the new year. “You’re intentionally creating this bridge between where you are right now and the version of yourself in the future that you want to grow into,” she said.
Robbins asks herself six introspective questions:
- What were the low points of your year?
- What were the high points?
- What did you learn this year?
- What are you going to stop doing?
- What are you going to continue doing?
- What are you going to start doing?
“You can’t create directions for where you want to go unless you know where you’re starting from,” she said of the importance of these questions.
Another powerful exercise she mentions on the podcast and one that experts recommend is writing a letter to your future self. It “helps people concentrate on their goals,” New York-based therapist Gail Purvis previously told CNBC Make It.
It also helps people feel closer to that future version of themselves that they want to become, according to research from the University of California, Los Angeles, and California State University that Robbins cited in the episode.
Whichever exercise you choose to try, “if you never stop and force yourself to take a look at your life,” said Robbins, “you miss the chance to take control of your life and make it better.”
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