The New Year is upon us and with it comes the desire to improve and start anew. For many, this manifests as resolutions to “eat better,” “exercise more” or “lose weight.”

Despite the best of intentions, many people struggle to maintain these resolutions yearlong, and by February gym floors are empty and new fitness gear has been left forgotten in the backs of closets.

While it may seem that sticking to a resolution is impossible, positive change in health and fitness is achievable. To increase your likelihood for success, shift your focus this year from what you resolve to do to how you’ll do it. Here are four proven strategies for ensuring that your 2018 New Year’s Resolution is one that sticks.

How many times have you thought to yourself, “I can’t lose weight because my metabolism is slow.” Over the past two decades as nutritionists, we’ve heard that time and again from our clients. How do you know if your metabolism is actually slow? Can it be fixed? And is the problem really your metabolism?

Simply put, metabolism is the way your body converts the food and drink you consume for energy, and is usually measured in calories. We can determine how many calories your body burns each day by plugging information into a variety of formulas that have been designed to measure this. Click here to access the formulas and see what you get. As there is no single calculation that is considered the best, we recommend that you do all of the formulas, which will give you a range in which your metabolism may fall. A more accurate way is to have your metabolism measured through indirect calorimetry, which uses a machine to measure oxygen consumption. In less than 10 minutes you can know your resting metabolic rate (RMR).