This Year I Will...: How to Finally Change a Habit, Keep a Resolution, or Make a Dream Come True

• The Life Organizer: A Woman's Guide to a Mindful Year
• It's All Too Much: An Easy Plan for Living a Richer Life with Less Stuff
• The Open Mind: Exploring the 6 Patterns of Natural Intelligence
• Eliminate Chaos: The 10-Step Process to Organize Your Home and Life
• One Year to an Organized Life: From Your Closets to Your Finances, the Week-by-Week Guide to Getting Completely Organized for Good

Are you really ready to change? Take this quiz and find out.


Every New Year’s Day, my list of resolutions is:
Ambitious. I aim for everything from losing weight to saving more money for my retirement.
Realistic. I just try to bump my good behavior up a notch--be a better friend, give more money to charity---without giving myself any strict deadlines or goals.
Precise. I decide exactly how many men I will ask for a date, or how many new jobs I will apply for.

Whenever I decide to change something, it’s usually because:
My doctor has put the fear of God into me.
I read a magazine article about why making this change is important.
I start daydreaming about how great life will be after I make the change.

True or False: When you want to make a big change in your life, timing is crucial.

Failure is:
Impossible.
Inevitable.
Not in my vocabulary.

(The answers are on the inside back flap.)

Learn the secret to making changes that stick

Every so often people get inspired (again!) to lose weight, get organized, start saving, or stop worrying –but a few months later they give up, frustrated. It doesn’t have to be that way. In This Year I Wil . . .l, bestselling author M.J. Ryan offers breakthrough wisdom and coaching to help readers make this time the time that change becomes permanent.

Why do people find it so hard to change? The secret is that everyone has their own formula for making changes that stick, but most people don’t know what theirs is. They think there is one way to lose five pounds, and another way to stay on top of their e-mail, but they don’t realize that for all changes, there is one system that works best for each individual. This Year I Will . . . helps you lock on to your unique formula for planning, implementing, and seeing a life change through, so you can use it again and again to tackle anything else you’d like to do.

For anyone who has broken a New Year’s resolution, fallen off a diet, or given up on fulfilling a dream, the ingenious strategies, inspiring stories, and sheer motivational energy of This Year I Will . . . help you make a promise to yourself that you can actually keep.

Answers to the jacket quiz: c, c, false, b. Take the whole quiz and learn your score at M.J. Ryan’s Web site, www.mj-ryan.com.

It's just an outstanding book. For once in my life, I truly feel that this may actually be the year where I reach some of my goals. This is truly a gem and I am so thankful that I found this book. Thank you MJ Ryan. This book not only helps you with how to set goals and reach them, but also helps you to figure out why you may not have reached them in the past AND how to reach them now that you know what the problem may be. I think everyone who wants to reach their goals should have a copy of this book in their personal libray. I will definitely be looking up other publications by this author.

I initially requested it from the library, but I know that I have to purchase my own copy. I can't say enough good things about it. :) It's never boring and so enlightening.

By being all too aware of our imperfections, and learning how to apologize to and forgive ourselves, we can't help but become more compassionate to ourselves and to others in the process. As all the other reviewers point out, this book is well-written, compassionate, specific and smart. (I am especially impressed by the short chapter on urge surfing, and her suggestion to identify and differentiate Sensory feedback, Images, Feelings and Thoughts [SIFT]). Better than any other writer I've come across, MJ Ryan weaves together the neurological, spiritual and global. What impressed me most, however, is her conclusion: that practicing a new habit not only builds character, enabling us to tackle new challenges, but expands the soul.

This book is a priceless work.Thanks to the author and good luck to everyone else who reads it. Something I never could have claimed before in my 30+ years. Even the ones who don't read are reading it. I've seen weight loss, better jobs, less stress, less anger, reduced drinking, happier relationships. I spent a lot of time wondering why I never got anything done but never did anything beyond wondering. If you find yourself in a rut and just can't seem to move forward. I've read a LOT of self help material and found hidden gems here and there.

I only wish I had found THIS book years earlier. I've given them away to a lot of the people I kind of left behind when I started changing my old life. It's help me put all of that into action. Or even if you're doing fine and think you might just need a little push. all as a result of things myself and these people have learned through the steps in this book. I'm someone who spent years stuck in a rut.

A lot of these changes have been hard work. Everything I've learned. I've spent the last few years turning my entire life around. I'm on my second time reading it and I just bought three more copies, bringing my total purchased to eight. I quit drinking, quit smoking, started working out, started taking my job seriously (which has garnered me two promotions in three years), and generally started taking charge of my life and I've found that I love getting up and getting to it every day. Everything I've known.

Well, this is the book for you. Have you ever run across a situation where you KNOW you could teach the world how to do something but you just CAN'T do it yourself.

I have used some of the described exercises to help my clients envision their future the way they desire it to be. This book is well written and easy to understand. The explanation of how the various parts of the brain and how to get your brain working for you was very good. I recommend this book highly. An easy read that doesn't require a psychology degree to understand the material and how to use it.

This is really one of those you can change your life books that actually work. I would highly recommend for anyone who wants to make some changes in their life but is have a hard time doing so. I loved the way it was written and I really felt like she cared about me.