If you've failed at keeping your New Year's resolutions in the past, scientists say this may be because you've chosen the wrong ones or don't admit to yourself that you may fail (which, surprisingly, will help to you succeed). One common mistake is to have too many goals. Another formula for failure is to set your sights on behaviors that are too vague, such as being a better spouse. A third pitfall is setting goals that are too lofty and are not really attainable. What does work? The Harvard Health Letter says you're more likely to achieve goals that match your own interests and values, rather than those that reflect outside pressures or expectations. In other words, you're more likely to keep a resolution if the motivation is coming from you, not someone else.
You also need to come up with a strategy that's rooted in practical steps. Link the desired behaviors to common events or to habits you already have, so the new behavior becomes more or less automatic. For example, you might improve your pill-taking habits by putting your medications next to your toothbrush.
Is your resolution to quit smoking again this year? Anticipating that you will fail might help you succeed.
"A more productive approach than quitting cold turkey is to think about tobacco dependence as a chronic disease, and expect that there might be periods of relapse and remission," says psychologist Patricia Daza. "On average, most smokers make between five and six attempts to quit before they are successful."
About 25% of people in the United States smoke—that's 50 million people. Half of them try to quit each year, but only five to 10% still don't smoke a year later.
Nicotine can be as addicting as heroin, especially so for psychiatric patients. For patients with schizophrenia, the rate of cigarette smoking can be as high as 88%. Dr. Daza recommends making a plan to quit smoking:
1. Set a date to quit. 2. Tell co-workers, family and friends about your quit date. 3. Clean your house, car and any other place where you typically smoke. Remove all ashtrays, deodorize your house and car to remove the smell of smoke and remove any items that might remind you of smoking. 4. If you usually drink coffee while you smoke, switch to orange juice or another beverage to break the link between drinking a specific beverage and smoking. 5. Recognize that the most intense withdrawal symptoms happen in the first three weeks. 6. Keep a list of reasons for quitting in places you typically smoked.
Nicotine replacement aids such as nicotine gum and the patch, help with withdrawal symptoms and can be purchased over the counter. Smokers can also ask their doctor to prescribe them the drug Zyban, which stimulates the release of a feel-good chemical in the brain, called dopamine, to simulate the effect of nicotine. Studies have shown that the use of the drug doubles quit rates when compared with quitting cold turkey.
Most relapses occur within the first three months after a person stops smoking. One third of relapses occur because of alcohol use, Dr. Daza says. If you do relapse, treat it as a bump in the road rather than proof that you can't quit.
Art credit: http://www.freeimages.co.uk
The most common New Year's resolution is losing weight. Do this the easy way, with scientifically sound diet advice from Anne Strieber that's actually fun to read—and it's FREE! Read Anne's diet book What I Learned From the Fat Years.
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Posts by RD
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Holy fuck
It looks amazing now. Great mountains and light. I hope you dont screw the layout, it could be mapkorpak material
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Thats not how i pictured Izone to look like. And i didnt know he actually mapped. What did you guys do, stripbars and stuff? MORE PICS!
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HAPPY 2k6!!!~
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Yeah i dunno if its about the length of a reply. I posted giant texts in EOT without problems
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Some of it blinds me just looking at the screenshots and if your map has darker spots it might not be fair
Also maybe its me but the light looks a bit too atmospheric. Ppl are gonna play this for hours if its gonna be CAL, shouldnt look depressing or ppl will get tired of it.Anyways ill play thru it laters
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i dont know why Bluestrike, but your shots are always awesome
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still cant reply
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I just noticed, its smiling.
Well i can understand its happiness
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it musta been a dream about mazy
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Whats up with his thumb and the bottom of his hand then? A trick of the light?
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Loving it, cougars number 5 and the bridge shot
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What in the world of all that is holy
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awesome
Cant you just make a giant mower in front instead of the gun, so you can run people over
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like the hand, but its photoshopped right
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i just wrote a long reply, but i cant post it for some reason so ill try later
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Anyone else have this?
Not always, but in the last 3 days or so often when i write a long reply and post it, i just get a blank white page that says something like "the source cannot be shown" (its in dutch so i dunno the exact words in english). Also happens when i try to edit my own long posts. Hope this one gets thru
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the last shot looks like that place from silence of the lambs :cry
:Anyways it looks pretty good, almost to the point of awesome in some shots
All i miss is like a centerpiece that makes the map unique, cuz theres already so many prison maps for hl2, but this one has new textures at least -
Looks like Klein has hit a writers block when hes not in his working space