Family Goals for a Healthier, Happier 2025

With the year nearly over and 2025 right around the corner, this is the time of year where everyone starts to make resolutions for the upcoming year. 

While New Years Resolutions are a great start when it comes to change, they often don’t stick for long past January – or February, if you’re lucky. Instead, why not take an opportunity to set goals together as a family this year?

Family goal-setting is a great way to help instill life-long habits into your children that will allow them to live happy, healthy lives. Taking time to set goals together as a family teaches your kids that creating habits takes time and effort, but that it’s worth it in the long run. Additionally, setting goals that everyone works on together over the course of a year works to create trust and closeness between everyone in the family. 

In this blog, we’ll go over some different goals that you and your family can work towards together. This year, commit to teaching your child habits that will help them lead better lives as adults through working towards goals together! 

Fitness Goals

A lot of people are scared by the word “fitness” - and we get it! Working out can be a scary experience for those unfamiliar with it, weighted with stigma and preconceived ideas. 

However, physical activity is an essential part of a healthy lifestyle, especially when considering exercise for seniors. You don’t have to go to the gym for an hour every single day to practice physical fitness – instead, think about goals that will simply help your family be more active this year than they were last year. 

Here are some simple fitness goals you can make with your family: 

Try a new sport 

Especially for children, participating in a team sport is a great way to not only help them stay physically fit, but it also can help them make friends and teach them the value of teamwork. If your child is not already involved in a sport, encourage them to try out for a sport at school or to join a little league sport.

You can also find a sport that the whole family is curious to try together! On the weekends or after school throughout the year, your whole family can head to a local park or community center to play basketball, tennis, soccer, volleyball, or any other sport together. Before you spend a lot of money on equipment, see if you have access to rental equipment anywhere in your community! 

Step goals

Depending on everyone’s age, level of ability, and current activity level, set weekly or monthly step goals for everyone to try to meet. Each person’s step goal can be different, or you can set an overall family goal that everyone works together to meet. 

The recommended minimum number of steps per day will differ from person to person based on their age and current activity level. While 6,000-10,000 steps is the recommendation for the average adult, your goal should take into consideration how many steps your family’s current average steps, as well as everyone’s current ability to achieve a higher step count. This is the benefit of setting weekly or monthly goals – it allows for off days and unforeseen circumstances. 

Run a 5k together 

Having the goal of running a 5k together at the end of the year is a great goal! Five kilometers is equal to about 3.1 miles. While that might sound like a scary distance to someone who isn’t familiar with running or to small children, it’s a very manageable distance with a little bit of practice! 

You can find all sorts of 5k training resources on the internet that will help you improve your endurance day by day to be ready for a 5k. The Couch to 5k plan is a popular running schedule for beginner runners to help them build up endurance. Talk to your whole family about your desire to run a 5k together, let them know about the plan, and try to make running together a fun and exciting bonding experience for the family!

Health Goals

Outside of exercise, there are other things you can do to help your family prioritize their health. The ideas your children have about nutrition and the choices they make today will lay the foundation for their perspective on health as adults, so it’s important to do your best to teach them healthy habits now. 

Try new foods

Especially with young kids or picky eaters, food aversions can be a huge hurdle to your family’s nutrition. Setting a goal that encourages your children to try new foods 

Remember that when it comes to children, you want to encourage a well-balanced, healthy perspective on food as much as possible. Don’t make dessert a “reward” for trying new foods, force children to finish their entire plate, or make comments about “good” or “bad” food. Instead, practice positive reinforcement by praising your children for their willingness to branch out. 

We know that nutrition can be a particularly challenging hurdle for parents and kids, so we wrote a blog to help you navigate childhood nutrition. If someone in your family struggles with nutrition, check it out for helpful tips and insights! 

Daily water goals

Depending on their age, weight, and gender, everyone in the family will have a different recommended daily water intake. Talk to your pediatric provider about how many ounces of water each child should aim for. 

Stretch daily

Most children are fairly mobile and have no problems navigating the world. As we age, though, our bodies become less limber and adept if we aren’t careful. Incorporate regular stretching into your family goals this year to teach your children the value of taking care of their body. Taking this habit with them into adulthood will help them more easily recover from injuries and will allow them to retain their full mobility for longer. 

Wellness Goals 

The word “wellness” is used today to refer to elaborate skincare routines, supplements, and gimmicky weight loss tactics. That’s not the kind of wellness we’re talking about here! Wellness refers to the practice of incorporating habits into your day-to-day to improve your quality of life. 

Contrary to cultural belief, wellness is a long-term practice. Outside of your physical health, there are other things you can do to help everyone in your family improve their quality of life. Here are some easily, family-friendly ways to practice wellness: 

Spend time outside

According to this study from 2019, a person should aim to spend at least two hours outdoors every week. If you wanted to break that down a bit, it would be about 15-20 minutes per day. 

Spending time outside can have a wide variety of effects on a person’s overall quality of life. The most common known benefit of spending time outside is that the sun provides Vitamin D, which improves a person’s bone health. Additionally, studies show a plethora of other positive effects from spending time outside, from reducing stress and depression to decreasing blood pressure and increasing a person’s lifespan. 

Aim to spend a certain amount of time with your family outside every week! Once again, feel free to tailor this time to your family’s current lifestyle. While 120 minutes a week is the minimum recommendation, this might feel hard to achieve if your kids currently spend no time outside. Start with a goal that’s easy to obtain and then work your way up from there. 

Practice gratitude together 

As adults, we understand that life doesn’t always go the way we want it. Children, however, are still developing that understanding. They most likely have not faced the same disappointments and grief that adults have. 

Teaching your children gratitude while they are young will help them better cope with disappointments when they are older. Despite whatever bad is happening in their lives, teaching them to look for the good things can help them regulate and process their emotions more effectively as they get older. 

Set a regular time every day, week, or month to get together and talk about what you are grateful for. You can simply share this verbally at dinner, or you can make some sort of game or activity for it. 

Family Activities 

A great way to prioritize togetherness and form closer bonds within your family is through planning group activities. Group activities don’t have to be expensive outings or elaborate trips – more than anything, your children want to spend time with you and with each other, which can happen in a variety of different ways. Some great ways to intentionally spend more time together include the following:

Take a trip

Traveling as a family can benefit your child’s development in so many ways. First, taking a family trip provides plenty of bonding opportunities among everyone, which can grow closeness and trust within families. Additionally, going on trips can expose your children to other cultures and ways of living, which helps them develop empathy, understanding, and cultural awareness. Other than that… traveling is fun! Taking trips together will give your family opportunities to make lifelong memories together. 

Once again, we want to emphasize that this doesn’t have to be expensive or elaborate. If you can afford a vacation to a different state or even a different country, fantastic! If not, you can still create wonderful experiences for your children. For more budget-friendly travel ideas: 

• Drive to a local state park and spend the weekend camping. Make a point to discover local flora and fauna together. 

• Spend a weekend at a hotel in a local city. Even if you’re only a few hours away from home, your children will love spending time at the hotel pool, trying a new restaurant or activity in the city, and the novelty of spending the night away from home!

• Rather than planning one big family trip, you can also plan a handful of weekend activities throughout the course of the year. A few trips to local museums, zoos, or botanical gardens will be much less expensive than one big trip. A lot of these activities are discounted or even free, depending on the location and the day, so pay attention to ticket sales or special deals for families. 

No matter your budget, taking trips together provides valuable opportunities for development and growth among your whole family. 

Volunteer

This year, make it a point to give back to your community together with your family! Not only does this give you an opportunity to bond as a family, but it also shows your children the needs that exist in their community and how they can help out others. 

Work together to find a cause that the whole family is passionate about. Then, research charities in your community that work for that cause, and find ways to get involved! You can make a semi-regular schedule for your family to all volunteer together. 

Conclusion

More than anything you say, your children watch what you do. With all of your family goals, your kids will only participate and be excited about them if you are! Set a good example by working alongside these goals with your children. When you meet these goals, celebrate together! When you don’t, be honest and gracious towards one another. 

Remember, these goals are meant to help you and your family form lifelong habits that will improve your overall quality of life. Be patient, and learn to look at progress over perfection. For ideas and suggestions specific to your family and their needs, talk to your pediatric provider! Your provider will know your family well and should be able to help you tailor your goals to your specific needs.

Happy New Year to you and your family! We hope your goals help you become happier and healthier this year!