New Year’s Resolutions Based On Guilt Can Cause Mental Harm

New Year’s resolutions that are driven by guilt can be more harmful than helpful.

That is according to local psychotherapist Dr. David Eisenmenger. He said if a fitness goal is not completed, it can cause a sense of failure that leads to self hatred.

“One of the places is comparing yourself to other people and feeling like you’re not good enough unless you achieve all the things that they achieved,” Eisenmenger said. “If you have a positive self attitude and set a goal for yourself not comparing yourself to other people, you’re more than likely to have more successes.”

Eisenmenger said other common resolutions such as making more money can have the same effect. Eisenmenger said rather than a resolution, create a stepped plan to achieve your goal and include others for support.

“A resolution is really not a well planned out goal,” Eisenmenger said. “A goal requires a plan and steps to take and often needs other people to bounce ideas off of. Where as a resolution is very vague and is very easy to resolve to do something but just not do it, because you don’t know the first step.”

Eisenmenger said self-imaging is both a good and bad powerful tool for humans. Eisenmenger said a positive image can do wonders when trying to achieve a goal.