New Year’s resolutions are often broken within the first few months (or even days). Kyriel Manzo encourages you to keep this in mind: keep it simple.

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The romantic idea of setting a New Year’s resolution has changed our lives for the better, or completely flopped within the first few months of the New Year. We’ve all been guilty of losing faith in our goal or our own ability to achieve it. These are the four most common resolutions we bail on because…well…it’s so easy to cheat or lose sight of why we made the resolution in the first place.

Lose Weight

The first 2-80 days usually go great. But most of us get a little too ambitious, spend $200 on gym memberships and pre-workout drinks, read every article about burning fat and subscribe to a magazine where everyone on the cover looks like an Olympian. It’s great to have goals and ambition, but when we set unattainable daily routines, it’s difficult to sustain such an exhausting lifestyle. One pizza party at the office can start a downward spiral into old behaviors.

Make it more realistic:

Instead of setting a goal to lose 30lbs and obtain a six-pack by next year, set a goal to be a little more conscious of your body’s needs. Set a goal to feel healthier by next year. Set a goal to be happy with who you are, but make an effort to take care of the vessel that protects your soul.

Save Money

Not everyone is good at saving money. Not everyone thinks they even make enough money to set aside for savings. A lot of us have great intentions about saving. Even if it’s a goal to transfer $50 into savings every month or every other week, we often start off strong and fizzle out when the task of transferring money or dropping all of our spare change seems incredibly strenuous by the time March rolls around. By June, we don’t even remember what our resolution was and the coin jar looks depressing.

Make it more realistic:

For people looking to save little by little, try out the new Acorns app—it links to your bank account and rounds up every purchase to the nearest dollar and invests it into the stocks of your choice and saves whatever you choose not to invest. We tried this method and have save a little over $400 in the last six months just on spare change. You can set it up to automatically take a certain amount from your checking so you don’t have to do any of the thinking. You can also set up an automatic transfer into a savings account every pay period so the act of actually saving seems effortless.

Find Love

If you’re single or looking to end a bad relationship and find your perfect soulmate, the new year is usually a time where you tell yourself…it’s time. “This year I’m going to find love! This year I’m going to find happiness! This year I’m going to stop going after all the wrong mates!” We put so much pressure on finally finding love that our mindset is all wrong and the pressure transcends onto our dates when we go out. Desperation is not an aphrodisiac. Many people give up within the first few weeks because Prince Charming or Cool Girl didn’t show up within the first few dates.

Make it more realistic:

Don’t necessarily set a goal to “find love.” Set a goal to prepare yourself for the moment love comes along. Make yourself ready for a relationship and cultivate your stability so that if a love match happens, you’re emotionally ready for it. Find your happiness and clear your heart and mind of negativity so when you do find yourself attracted to a potential mate, you can do so with the realism of someone that is okay on their own and with a mate.

Change Careers/Continue Education

“The only thing standing between you and your goal is the bullshit story you keep telling yourself as to why you can’t achieve it.”

-Jordan Belfort

If you’re unhappy with where you are in life and can outline a few things you think you can do to get there, then you can get there. If you find that your work life isn’t satisfying and you want to pursue “your dream job”, then do it. If you want to go back to school or leave a desk job then the New Year is the perfect time to do it. As with dating and weight loss, if we don’t yield immediate results we often give up, wait for next year or tell ourselves the goal was unrealistic.

Make it more realistic:

Set one goal a month to get you closer to your ultimate goal. If you want to go back to school, set a goal to speak with advisers, arrange finances and figure out what you want to go back to school for. If the task is broken into little pieces it will seem more manageable and you won’t fizzle out within the first few months. If you want to change your career, start small and research what you would like to do, sign up for job alerts and make it a point to send out (x) number of resumes per month or week.

This year, take the pressure off of your resolution and “eat the elephant” one bite at at a time.