Jenny Morrissey, Managing Editor
People plan on making New Year’s resolutions, but in all honesty, they rarely ever are followed through. Despite the good intentions initially planned out when we declare a resolution, these goals mainly strike us with anxiety when we are unable to reach them. Of course, resolutions only have the best intentions, but that does not mean they are the ideal way we should strive for self-improvement.
Moments before 2013, I made the resolution to somehow be more outgoing, as I rarely step outside of my comfort zone. I wanted 2013 to be the best year of my life, and, at the time, I was not willing to let anything stop me. As of right now, I cannot judge whether or not it was the "best year of my life," as every year has its ups and downs, however I caught myself making the same mistake with the welcoming of 2014. Even though my intentions of wanting to change myself, for what I believe to be the “better”, I foolishly declared that my resolution would be a continuation of 2013.
I believe this repetition happens far too often. Opposed to accepting the failures that we have committed by admitting we were unable to complete our set goal, we obligate ourselves to push it further into the next year. By this point, the odds are in favor of us still being unable to reach our designated endpoints.
How are we supposed to exit this cycle of cheating ourselves into another lost year? I would like to say just get it done, but that is not so easy when we have habituated ourselves to do exactly what we are trying to oppose. Even though it would be easier if these changes could occur over night, they have been so engraved into our brains that it has almost become unfair to do this to ourselves.
I believe that the New Year is supposed to be a time to celebrate rather than suffer by trying to shave off a few pounds or to eat healthier. I am not suggesting that these are unobtainable goals, because they are not in the slightest. People who are committed to their objectives will be willing to accomplish them; resolutions just get in the way of this and add an unwanted pressure which certainly does not help. All of this added stress builds up over time, and will simply make us feel worse about ourselves when 2015 comes around.
Self-reflection and improvement are great to do especially at the beginning of a new year; it acts as a clean slate for us. There is just no point to this unless we are able to say we reached our goals which we are never going to do if we spend our time saying, “Oh, I can start again tomorrow,” or making excuses like, today is my day off.
The idea of a resolution is not meant to be an impossible result but to be a practical way to better ourselves. I am not advising against making resolutions in anyway; for some people, they can actually work and benefit us. I would just prefer to see improved people at the end of 2014 anxiously waiting for their new goals to begin and to celebrate the old, accomplished ones.
Photo credit to theuncritic.com.
