People think that once January rolls around, they will suddenly be able to easily lose all of the weight they want. However, just because it is a new year does not mean that humans can now have this super ability.

“Since it’s right after Christmas everyone just gorged themselves on holiday treats and all these different junk foods,” senior Maddie Schinstock said. “Now they think they need to lose all this weight and it’s a new year so they might as well start it here.”

The goal to lose weight often leads to harmful practices, such as pushing one’s body too hard when exercising and depriving it of its necessary food and calories.

These acts can do the opposite of making one healthier by bringing upon dangers to one’s body that they did not have before beginning their New Year’s diet.

In addition, unhealthy habits can bring serious stress as crash dieting results in increasing the brain’s levels of the stress hormone corticosterone. This can ultimately widen the risk of falling into depression or binge-eating behaviors.

Interestingly enough, crash dieting, or dieting with the aim of achieving very rapid results, can lead to future weight gain rather than the initial goal of shedding weight.

After limiting foods for so long, when coming off of a crash diet and eating normally again your body will want to rebuild by storing all the necessary fat it was deprived of.

There is also the danger of not eating enough and restricting the nutients your body needs.

“You can go overboard and stop eating and just eat little bits which is not good for the body,” senior Areeba Atique said.

Similar to damaging diets, excessive exercising may lead to mental complications like becoming more irritable, moody and self-conscious as well as becoming more prone to eating disorders. Anorexia and Bulimia are common disorders that can quickly affect someone who wants to shed weight without them noticing. Moreover, if one continually exercises, their mind is constantly pumping adrenaline and their thoughts are racing too fast, which upsets their sleep cycle and makes falling asleep much more difficult.

Exposing yourself to abrupt calorie restrictions and too much exercise causes the body and brain to alter significantly as they are not used to the stress that is suddenly brought upon them. The at first harmless New Year’s Resolution will start to hold back the body’s main function to survive.

“It’s never realistic because it’s in the middle of January and when you’re inside and it’s snowing outside, all you want to do is sit there and ignore homework and eat chocolate and junk food.” Schinstock said. “Maybe if it was in the summer [the goal] would be easier to reach, but in the winter it never is.”

A lot of people will fail in their New Year’s Resolution to lose weight and will be exhausted after attempting it.

This is true because many of these weight-loss seekers set up their goals too big and too fast. It is more effective to make goals specific and realistic so that they are levelled with what one’s body can deal with.

Over time, the goals can be altered to be more challenging, but not until one can physically and mentally handle it.

“I think especially when you’re a teenager it’s very easy to get caught up in losing weight and think that it’s only about the active losing weight and losing more weight whereas I think it should be more about just being healthy.” Schinstock said.

Instead of aiming for a target weight, it is a better idea to begin 2017 by making  a goal to make healthier food choices and moderately exercise.

In other words, break the one big objective into smaller and more measureable ones. This can be as simple as switching out chips for fruit and freeing 30 minutes in your schedule to fit in a daily workout.

It is also good to start tracking your progress as you work on these aims in order to ensure that you are doing well.

Using smartphone apps such as MyFitnessPal allows you to keep track of the foods you are eating and workouts you are doing. More likely than not, when you are aware of your behavior, you can change it.

“Don’t worry about it too much,” Atique said. “It’s okay if you end up failing it because half of the people don’t even achieve their New Year’s resolution.”

It is important to keep in mind that our bodies cannot cope with sudden changes before jumping into harmful diets and exercise routines.

Even though one may think they are doing a good thing for themselves by setting up the goal to lose weight this new year, if they are not careful with their choices they can bring great trauma to their well-being.

Overall, having this objective is not necessarily a bad thing as long as it is done correctly. The dangers that come with it occur when someone is not informed on the possible risks of certain actions. This is why it is safer to begin with smaller goals and slowly progress as your body adjusts to the changes in your routine.

Rethink the resolution to lose weight and whether you are doing it for the right reasons– is it for your own good and health, or for a certain way you want to look? Take it easy on yourself and work on your mind before your abs this year.