Five Apps to Help You Keep Your New Year’s Resolutions
By Mike Agerbo
January 03, 2018
Lifestyle
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Every year I take a bit of time to jot down a few New Year’s resolutions, hoping in vain to start the year off right. Inevitably, by mid-February I’ve fallen off the resolution wagon and I’m back to my old ways and I don’t think I’m the only one. Luckily, there are a number of apps available to help those of us who struggle with our resolutions. Here are five of my favourites, ranging from apps to help you keep track of your progress and resolutions to those to help you achieve specific ones.
iOS; $6.99
One of the biggest hurdles when it comes to achieving your New Year’s resolutions is being consistent. With consistency being the key to building good habits and breaking bad ones, Streaks is the perfect app to help you get there. Streaks lets you add tasks and reminders and allows you to track your progress in performing those tasks over time. Where this app shines is that it makes all of this simple and intuitive. It even makes it easy to see how long you’ve kept a streak going by displaying the information graphically on the app’s main screen. All in all, this is a great app to help you turn individual habits into tasks this year.
Android | iOS; Free
Budgeting and saving money appear on many people’s lists of New Year’s resolutions over and over again. This one is tough to achieve because it’s easy to lose track of all the bills, payments, and expenditures coming out of your account. After all, out of sight, out of mind! Mint helps you create budgets, wrangle all the bills and recurring expenses going through your account, and keep track of ad hoc expenditures. Mint even sends you weekly reports so help you stay on track. It takes a bit of time connect Mint to your bank accounts and set everything up, but it’s well worth it.
Android | iOS; Free
MyFitnessPal has been around for quite a while and with good reason: it’s a great tool to help you eat better. MyFitnessPal allows you to set calorie goals based on your weight goals and then track your calorie consumption relative to those goals. The great thing about MyFitnessPal is that it has an extensive database of foods and corresponding calorie counts, making logging your food quick and easy. If you can’t find what you’re looking for in MyFitnessPal’s extensive database, you can create a recipe from scratch ingredient by ingredient.
Android | iOS; Free
Meditation offers a range of benefits, such as improved focus and reduced stress. If you’re trying to get started with meditation and mindfulness in 2018, the Calm app is worth checking out. In face, Calm was selected as Apple’s 2017 App of the Year. It offers guided mediation sessions in a range of lengths. It also has over 60 sleep stories to help you fall asleep, unguided meditation, and exclusive music to help you focus, sleep, or relax. If an app isn’t your style, Calm even offers a web interface.
Android | iOS; $2.79
Smartphones are incredibly powerful tools but they’ve become a distraction for many of us. I often find myself scrolling through social media sites on my phone or sneaking in a game of Angry Birds when I could be doing something more productive. That’s why I’m excited to put Forest to good use in 2018. This app is designed to help you put down your phone and focus on other things by turning your time off of your phone into a little game. When you want to focus, simply plant a virtual tree within the Forest app and set the amount of time you’d like to focus. The tree will continue to grow as long as you stay off your phone. If you leave the app and use your phone before the time is up, your tree will wither and die. Over time, your success in growing your trees will turn into a forest and unlock new species of tress. It’s a fun way to kick that smartphone addiction and get back some of your precious time.
Turn Tasks into Habits: Streaks
iOS; $6.99
One of the biggest hurdles when it comes to achieving your New Year’s resolutions is being consistent. With consistency being the key to building good habits and breaking bad ones, Streaks is the perfect app to help you get there. Streaks lets you add tasks and reminders and allows you to track your progress in performing those tasks over time. Where this app shines is that it makes all of this simple and intuitive. It even makes it easy to see how long you’ve kept a streak going by displaying the information graphically on the app’s main screen. All in all, this is a great app to help you turn individual habits into tasks this year.
Budget and Save Money: Mint
Android | iOS; Free
Budgeting and saving money appear on many people’s lists of New Year’s resolutions over and over again. This one is tough to achieve because it’s easy to lose track of all the bills, payments, and expenditures coming out of your account. After all, out of sight, out of mind! Mint helps you create budgets, wrangle all the bills and recurring expenses going through your account, and keep track of ad hoc expenditures. Mint even sends you weekly reports so help you stay on track. It takes a bit of time connect Mint to your bank accounts and set everything up, but it’s well worth it.
Eat Better: MyFitnessPal
Android | iOS; Free
MyFitnessPal has been around for quite a while and with good reason: it’s a great tool to help you eat better. MyFitnessPal allows you to set calorie goals based on your weight goals and then track your calorie consumption relative to those goals. The great thing about MyFitnessPal is that it has an extensive database of foods and corresponding calorie counts, making logging your food quick and easy. If you can’t find what you’re looking for in MyFitnessPal’s extensive database, you can create a recipe from scratch ingredient by ingredient.
Become More Mindful: Calm
Android | iOS; Free
Meditation offers a range of benefits, such as improved focus and reduced stress. If you’re trying to get started with meditation and mindfulness in 2018, the Calm app is worth checking out. In face, Calm was selected as Apple’s 2017 App of the Year. It offers guided mediation sessions in a range of lengths. It also has over 60 sleep stories to help you fall asleep, unguided meditation, and exclusive music to help you focus, sleep, or relax. If an app isn’t your style, Calm even offers a web interface.
Eliminate Distractions: Forest
Android | iOS; $2.79
Smartphones are incredibly powerful tools but they’ve become a distraction for many of us. I often find myself scrolling through social media sites on my phone or sneaking in a game of Angry Birds when I could be doing something more productive. That’s why I’m excited to put Forest to good use in 2018. This app is designed to help you put down your phone and focus on other things by turning your time off of your phone into a little game. When you want to focus, simply plant a virtual tree within the Forest app and set the amount of time you’d like to focus. The tree will continue to grow as long as you stay off your phone. If you leave the app and use your phone before the time is up, your tree will wither and die. Over time, your success in growing your trees will turn into a forest and unlock new species of tress. It’s a fun way to kick that smartphone addiction and get back some of your precious time.