You had me at the "beauty of self-experimentation" @the-alien and my trials and outcomes seem to match yours. After making several severe (and, as it turns out, unrealistic) resolutions, I've decided to scale down.

Similarly, instead of grand proclamations made at the beginning of the year and broken shortly after, with mounting guilt and sense of despair, I trick myself into making smaller sacrifices and commitments, day to day.

The hope is, one day, I will also trick myself into taking a great leap to become the person I, ideally, wish to be - and, at that point, it will no longer require a big leap - as I've been inching towards it, for a lifetime.

"We are what we repeatedly do. Excellence is not an act, but a habit.”
-Aristotle