If you were on social media this fall, you’ll remember that we were bombarded with posts about the Great Lock-in of 2025.
The challenge, which encourages people to “lock in” and work on achieving new goals from September until the end of December, prompted thousands of Instagram and TikTok users to post online their personal improvement efforts, from losing weight to saving money and saving money at work.
Similar to the previous “Winter Ark,” “75 Hard,” and “75 Soft” challenges, many users said The Great Lock-In, while falling short of their New Year’s resolutions, gave them a motivational boost to achieve short-term, focused goals.
Now, just about 120 days later, here’s how four women achieved their year-end resolutions.
morning power hour
Crystal Rominiy, 37, of Los Angeles, says her biggest change has been improving her morning routine.
In September, Romini, a travel advisor, decided to take an hour every morning for herself and changed her wake-up time to 6:15 a.m. over the course of about a week.
As she sees it, “How you spend the first hour of your day sets the tone for your day. Are you awake? Do you exercise? Do you meditate? Do you pray? Have a hearty breakfast? Or do you snooze?”
Rominii says she walks at least three miles during her morning power hour (about 7,000 steps toward her daily step count of 10,000), then returns home and eats a protein-rich breakfast before starting work.
A quiet morning, she says, allows her to “get things done in peace and quiet without the phone ringing or people asking me questions.” Plus, starting earlier means “I checked two major items off my to-do list by 8 a.m.,” which gives me the energy to tackle my work day and personal to-dos as a mother of a teenage son.
Save thousands of dollars on skin care using AI
The Great Lock-In Challenge inspired Jenny Park to save money on her beauty routine.
Park, 42, is the founder of a digital media brand in Washington, DC. After spending 15 years in the beauty field, Park says she stopped thinking twice about spending thousands of dollars on luxury beauty treatments.
Jenny Park used ChatGPT to turn her $2,800 beauty routine into a $200 lineup.
Courtesy of the subject
Park says the social media challenge inspired her to try something new. She used ChatGPT to plug in each product she used, prompting her to find cheaper alternatives, often from Korean beauty lines, based on her skincare needs and goals.
As a result, she switched out her $2,800 routine called SK-II, La Mer, and La Prairie for a new beauty lineup that costs just about $200 and includes products like Anua, Numbudin, and Biodance.
According to Park, her winning ChatGPT prompt included four main components:
Context such as skin type, lifestyle, and environment Details about your goals, preferences, and budget Assign a skincare expert role to ChatGPT and think about how you want to provide the information, including structured comparisons and ingredient breakdowns
“Honestly, at 42 years old, I think my skin is better than it’s ever been in my life,” she says, adding that she’s now putting the money she saves from skincare changes into investing in stocks and cryptocurrencies.
Level up at work or at the gym
Deirdre Henry, 39, has been on her own version of the Winter Edition for the past three years and, inspired by The Great Lock-In, has set new goals for the fall.
The New York City-based tech founder focused on setting goals in two areas of her life: career and health.
At work, I decided to post on LinkedIn three times a week, Instagram twice a week, and TikTok twice a day, while maintaining my Instagram threads as a platform for my leisure time.
By day 60, Henry says he was back on track. She says her consistent posting on LinkedIn helped her land four new clients, two speaking engagements, and her first major brand deal.
Deirdre Henry says consistently posting on LinkedIn has helped her acquire new clients, speaking engagements, and brand deals.
Courtesy of the subject
Henry also set a weekly gym schedule where he worked out before 9 a.m. every Monday, Tuesday, Thursday, and Saturday. This routine gave her structure and forced her to set boundaries for her practice. If someone wants to schedule a morning work meeting or a friend wants to schedule a Saturday breakfast, Henry has learned to say no or suggest an alternative in order to keep gym time.
Henry says the short duration of The Great Lock-in and similar social media challenges allows her to set more achievable goals instead of setting year-long goals that can be postponed every month. It also makes it easy to track your weekly progress.
“It gave me more motivation and validation that I was locked in than I can explain,” Henry says.
A pre-bedtime routine that I look forward to
Bella Jones, 44, of New York, publicly announced that she would take more time off. It sounds easy, but according to Gallup, only 42% of Americans say they get enough sleep.
Jones, who owns a personal finance company and business consultancy, said her demanding career in corporate finance meant she logged just four to five hours a night for years.
Slow progress is still progress.
In September, she started changing her bedtime from midnight to around 10 p.m., and established a calming routine that included drinking tea, reading a book, and using a heated eye massager before bed.
She says her new routine makes getting ready for bed “more fun” and something she looks forward to.
She’s also cut down on the amount of doom scrolling she does before bed, but she doesn’t completely deny herself. (She now limits it to two nights a week.)
Ms Jones said her new habit was not about “turning on” and she still struggled to take breaks on time between her busy work schedule. But she doesn’t look at a bad night and go crazy for the next day. “Be kind to yourself,” she says. “It’s not all or nothing. Even slow progress is progress.”
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