There are two things wrong with this:
1. They haven't found the key to long term change - even though it was right there in front of them.
2. Failure has provided them with an excuse to procrastinate for another 11 months!
A zillion diets fail because people give in to human desires - and then are abandoned because of one little slip. Any goal that you are working towards is likely to have one or two setbacks, but why is that a good reason to give up? All it offers is an opportunity to rectify the situation and come back stronger and more successful.
Why do so many of us use a small error as a reason to stop trying to achieve?
The key to long change is something really mundane - habit. To succeed in anything you need to develop the habits that help you to succeed.
A habit is simply something you do automatically without thinking about it and it takes a while to develop a habit. You have to concentrate on it daily for three or four weeks, taking conscious action until you start doing it automatically.
You clean your teeth automatically, you drive the car automatically, you even put the kettle on automatically (if you're a keen tea or coffee drinker). These habits are formed by constant repetition - and your new actions need the same kind of repetition to form helpful habits. This means that you won't need to look into the future of trying to remember to do new things forever, just take it a week at a time.
If you use a diary regularly put it into your diary with a reminder daily to give your memory a nudge. If you have a mobile phone with an alarm, set a reminder alarm daily. Build the new habits into your daily routine and before long you'll find they are just 'how you do things'.
Remember, it doesn't have to be the first of January to set a goal - you can do this any time of the year, on any day of the week (doesn't have to be a Monday), or at any time of day.
The key to success is to see it as a journey to a destination. There will be the occasional wrong turns, slipping back when you feel like you should be going forward, but as long as you keep going you will get there. Set the new habits in place and the journey will get easier and easier.
