Expert's five 'genius' hacks to smash your New Year goals in 2025

Mel Robbins (Image: Getty)

Whether your New Year resolution is not to drink alcohol, or to stop smoking, or to become fitter than ever, it's cliche that many give up by the end of January.

To help people achieve whatever their goals may be, motivational speaker Mel Robbins revealed the five simple hacks you must implement to increase your chance of success.

On her podcast, The Mel Robbins Podcast, the 56-year-old said: "If you're serious about making change stick, get out of your head."

First, be clear about the why behind each of your goals – you need to know why you want to achieve what you want to do.

For example, do you want to stop smoking so that you can spend more time with your grandchildren as they grow up?

Waking up to see your workout gear at your feet increases the likelihood you're going to exercise (Image: Getty)

Whatever goal you may have, the first hack is to "make it visible" – you need to put your goals "in front of your face".

Mel emphasised that having post-it notes on your bathroom mirror, for example, helps you to see your goals. This is what Mel does – and this means she sees her goals first thing in the morning and before she goes to bed at night.

"Make sure you can't miss it," Mel advised, adding that your goals need to be visible in a place that you see everyday.

If you want to exercise first thing in the mornings, then placing your workout clothes on the floor next to your bed means you're visibly going to see it.

By putting your goals front and centre like the above example, you are effectively reducing decision fatigue where you mull around thinking about whether to exercise or not.

If you don't store snacks in the house, you're less likely to snack at home (Image: Getty)

Set alarms on the phone for specific goals, said Mel, labelling this a "genius" hack. The next hack is to "remove temptations from sight", so if you're not going to eat junk food, get all the junk food out of your house.

Whichever bad habit you're trying to stay away from, remove any temptation from your sight. If you don't want to drink alcohol, don't have alcohol in the house; if you don't want to eat chocolate, don't store it in the kitchen cupboards.

Another important hack is to track your progress, which is a "non-negotiable" if you want to succeed.

While Mel prefers tracking her progress on a paper chart she can physically see and tick off, others may benefit from a digital record tracker to gamify the experience.

Checking off a check-list can feel rewarding (Image: Getty)

Anybody who can see that they've missed a day of exercising, for example, can shake it off and get back on it the next day to check it off. Mel promised that "you're more likely to success if your visibly record your progress".

It's also important to make a plan; for example, if you don't want to drink alcohol and get invited to a party, then you need to plan to take a non-alcoholic beverage with you.

This was called "if then planning", where you need to plan around obstacles that could put you off track. To illustrate, Mel's goal is to exercise outside twice a week, but if it rains, she has a back-up plan to do another at-home exercise regime.

And, finally, Mel's last bit of advice is to "do it in the morning" if it's a task you're likely to put off.