The No.1 New Year's resolution is losing weight when it should be improve body composition.
This may seem pedantic but it's an extremely important distinction to make if you want to finally succeed in achieving that dream physique.

When you go by what the scales say alone you start making some terrible choices on ways to get rid off those excess pounds. Slashing calories, demonising certain macronutrients, crash diets, excessive cardio and even most boot camps are what most people turn to since they all seem to work great in getting quick results. For the first few months of employing these choices the bodyweight seems to fly off. But soon enough results start to taper and eventually become non-existent.

Advocating proper food selections and calorie control is boring. There’s nothing innovative, cutting edge or sexy about it. To tell someone to follow sensible, basic principles almost seems archaic and uninformed.

There has to be a new revolutionary way that’s easier, more efficient and pain-free, right?

Well I'm sorry, there simply isn't.

“Macro-bashing” plays to people’s desires. These plans seem like they require more discipline, as you have to eliminate certain food groups, but the opposite is true. Eliminate that nutrient, and you can eat as much as you want of everything else, demonizing it as the cause of all of our body fat problems.

These diets simply trick you into believing that you're doing something special that may be the secret in achieving your physique goals when those basic nutrition principles would have sufficed. All you have to do was stick to them.

Understand what is required of you in order to achieve your goals.
I was recently speaking to someone who told me he wanted to get stronger. When I asked him what his training was like, he told me he was following a popular program he found on the Internet that had him doing 25 rep sets on his key lifts. He then questioned me as to why I trained my key lifts in sets of 1-5 reps.

Your goals should define the way you train and your program. They inform your decisions on rest between sets, overall workout volume, rep ranges to aim for, exercises you do, intensity and recovery days you take.
Don't just follow advice given to you regarding any parameter of your training without considering your goals first and how if it truly suits your purposes.