The Resolve for Resolutions
New Year, new resolutions - or not | Casual Disquisitions #4
In this second week of January (it is currently early evening, Wednesday, January 8th) I have resolved to write of resolutions - though I have none. Which is both true and false. But mostly true.
The new year often brings the burgeoning sense of new beginnings. People are inspired to start new things, learn new things, or end things that have served them in a negative way.
The impulse to make New Year’s Resolutions is a strong one. It’s not just the inadvertent peer pressure - the knowledge that almost everyone else is doing it. It’s not just the new calendar hanging on your wall urging you to look at the new year in a fresh light. It’s also the urge to better yourself. To make a positive change. To make this year better than the last (who actually has control of that? No one).
I have been ambivalent about New Year’s Resolutions for quite a few years now. Mostly, it was the disappointment of the start and stop motion of the whole thing. I’m going to journal more this year. I pick it up in April and realize I only journaled for a week before, not giving up, but forgetting. I’m going to go to the gym. I’m not even going to talk about that.
I’m going to give up —— insert whatever here. Maybe I did, maybe I didn’t.
My issue with New Years isn’t so much the self-recrimination at not keeping up with the goal. It’s the timing. And the pressure.
Why do we do this?
In “The History of New Year’s Resolutions”, author Sarah Pruitt briefly discusses the history of resolutions, which are thousands of years old. Pruitt writes.
During a massive 12-day religious festival known as Akitu, the Babylonians crowned a new king or reaffirmed their loyalty to the reigning king. They also made promises to the gods to pay their debts and return any objects they had borrowed. These promises could be considered the forerunners of our New Year’s resolutions. If the Babylonians kept to their word, their (pagan) gods would bestow favor on them for the coming year. If not, they would fall out of the gods’ favor—a place no one wanted to be. - Sarah Pruitt, “The History of New Year’s Resolution’s”
Later on in the article, Pruitt points out that, “while as many as 45 percent of Americans say they usually make New Year’s resolutions, only 8 percent are successful in achieving their goals”.
I was curious about the psychological aspect, as well, and Psychology Today, in their article “Fresh Starts: The Psychology Behind New Year Motivation” gives a very simple explanation.
The fresh start effect was introduced in behavioral science literature by Dai, Milkman, and Riis (2014). Described as days that “stand in marked contrast to the seemingly unending stream of trivial and ordinary occurrences” (Shum, 1998), their research demonstrated that we are more likely to initiate positive changes in our behavior following temporal landmarks, like birthdays, holidays, and, most notably, the new year. These landmarks create a sense of psychological distance from past disappointments and failures, allowing us to reframe our self-concept and set new intentions. - Psychology Today, “Fresh Starts: The Psychology Behind New Year Motivation”
And . . . So?
So, we’ve been doing something or other like this for a long time. There’s a simple psychological component, one that I had even stumbled upon in the first few paragraphs, that noting the new calendar date brought thoughts of “fresh” and “new beginning” to mind.
And, so what? If 45 percent of America (which is not including the worldwide population who are also making New Year’s Resolutions) make their resolution list, but only 8 percent achieve anything, what about the other 37 percent?
I have some thoughts.
The Resolutionless
You don’t have to make a single resolution, first of all. Some of you may think this is obvious, but maybe some need to read this: it doesn’t make you less than, it doesn’t mean you’re stuck where you are, and it certainly does not mean you will never grow or change.
You may be worn out. You may have other things on your plate. You may be still working on the resolutions from last year! Give yourself a break.
Goals Are Not A To-Do List
For some of us, it may be the formatting. Making a list of resolutions is very much like making a to-do list, and for me, making a list of resolutions that may look like this -
Exercise more
finish novel
read more books
write more
etc, etc, etc
That looks to me like a to-do list, and every entry comes with a host of actions and scheduling and effort that I am setting myself up for in the next coming year where I already have plenty of things in my day-to-day, not even including work.
It stresses me out, and I’m sure I’m not the only one.
But, in thinking this over, because this is in part some things I do want to do, I’ve come to think of it a little differently.
Goals are not a to-do list. Each of these are goals I would like to accomplish, but a lot of them are also continuous states of being that require habit-forming action and continual effort. Sure, I would like to exercise more, and consequently lose weight, but this isn’t something that has a static level of achievement. It’s a continual effort. It’s a component of a lifestyle.
The same with reading more, or writing more. It’s about how I manage my time and what I do with it. Sure, I can binge Netflix shows all evening every night after work, but then I would read less books, and I certainly would not be writing. Which is not to say that I would never binge a show, but as an occasional thing. What my daily and nightly activities would look like to accommodate these goals are what will allow me to achieve them.
Timing is - Sometimes - Everything
It can also be individual to a person. Where one person thrives at resolutions in the New Year, another person would do better waiting a month or two, or perhaps allowing themselves to come to the resolve of doing something new at the time that fits best.
There’s no law that says you can’t start exercising in June, instead of January. Now, I’m not giving people an “excuse” to put off starting, but if you end up skipping the gym for the next few months, there’s no reason not to start when you’re inspired to. Certainly, there’s no reason to wait until next January. Unless, of course, you want or choose to. Or the timing is better. Actually, timing is also connected with another factor.
You Have to Want It
How many times, if you have ever written New Year’s Resolutions, have you added something you did not really care about, but felt like you should?
With resolutions, in my opinion, there’s a pressure to have a theme of “bettering yourself”. In body, in mind, spiritually, even. The resolve is to be a “better person” by the end of the year. And because of this, I feel many people put items on their resolution list that they do not really want to do. Or care about.
In some ways, perhaps those items are not important right now and there are other, more pressing changes to be made.
Or, maybe, the resolutions actually look like a list of “What’s Wrong With Me and How To Change It” and the person should be resolving to have fun or learn to love themselves or really anything accept embark on reading a bunch of self-help books, go to an exercise class they hate, or apply to that job that they know they won’t like but pays more, etc.
And when the resolutions fall through, because they didn’t want to do it in the first place, they beat themselves up about it and resolve to try again next year.
Let’s - collectively - agree to not do that this year.
In Conclusion, I Resolve . . .
When I wrote that I didn’t make resolutions this year, it’s both true and false. I made a list of goals. I would like to build a lifestyle that has me achieving or continuing in these goals.
But, I don’t expect them all to pan out this year. Nor am I expecting them all to be accomplished within the year. But I have a path forward, and that is where the resolve of resolutions will move me onward, in to the new year, yes, but also forward in the journey of my life. And whenever I make more goals (resolutions), whether it be January or some other random month, I aim to keep in mind that it isn’t the list that is important, but who I have been, I am, and will be.