Instead of making a New Year’s resolution take time to consider the kind of life you want to live and the person you want to be.

Step 1: Write down who the important people in your life are and how you would like to interact with these people.

Why not draw a picture of how you want your life to be and pin it on your noticeboard so you can see it every day?

Step 2: Spend time becoming aware of the thoughts and feelings that you find uncomfortable and would prefer not to experience. Things like jealousy, anger, frustration, stress and anxiety might show up on your list.

Step 3: Now think about a time when you were jealous, angry, frustrated, stressed, or anxious. What did you do to get rid of these feelings? Did you shout, talk about someone behind their back, or be unkind? We all have auto-responses to our thoughts and feelings. Are your responses working for you to live the life you want to live? If not, consider how the person you want to be would respond to these.

Step 4: Next consider how the person you want to be would behave towards those important people. Commit to a few actions each day that would move you closer to being this person, thus developing new helpful habits and leaving those that don’t work behind.

Keep focused on who you want to be and don’t beat yourself up for responding in a way that didn’t work for you instead be kind to yourself knowing that you tried and think about what you can do right now in this moment to get back on track.