Resolutions revisited: making New Year's pledges that stick
By Kyra Hoggan
I have made and broken dozens of New Year’s resolutions before swearing off them altogether – resolving not to resolve, if you will. Now, I can’t live without them – because I’m no longer an idiot about how and why I make them.
For the longest time, I followed popular culture and made resolutions governing that about myself which I did not like, or felt needed improvement… quit smoking, exercise more, lose that extra weight, volunteer for a good cause. What a stupid thing to do, in retrospect. I didn’t see it as such because I never thought it through all the way to the end – worst-case scenario, a resolution doesn’t provide motivation enough for such a significant lifestyle change (surprise, surprise), so I’ve set myself up for failure and to feel crappy about myself. Happy New Year to me, for sure. Woo hoo. But what about the best-case scenario? I always thought that, should I follow through, I’d be getting something I really wanted, so it was worth a go, right? Wrong, wrong, wrong. Let’s say I did lose weight, exercise more, reduce my debt-load. Those are all significant life changes, requiring commitment and energy. To diminish them by attributing them to what amounts to little more than a continent-wide pledge-night lark makes them smaller somehow. I suppose it’s possible that nothing more than a New Year’s resolution has, upon occasion, inspired someone to break free of an addiction or alter the way they live their day-to-day lives – but I suspect those times are the exceptions that make the rule. Quitting smoking, exercising more, looking at debt differently – those aren’t one-night accomplishments (Nike’s ‘Just do it’ notwithstanding). They’re long-term wins earned over weeks and months and years, and should be celebrated as the massive triumphs of intent and follow-through that they are. So let’s just discard those big-picture successes from the realm of New Year’s Eve resolutions, shall we, rather than dumbing them down and making them somehow trite? That leaves many of us (myself included, a couple of years back), swearing off resolutions altogether. That’s just throwing the baby out with the bathwater. The turning point came for me when I started looking at my resolutions the same way I look at my bucket list, but instead of saying ‘what would I like to do before I die’, it became, ‘what would I like to do before this year is over?’. So I looked at all the things I’ve meant to do over the years, and started picking a handful of them for the coming calendar – last year, for example, I resolved to visit a nude beach (did it, but that’s a whole ‘nother column), learn to make sushi (I rock the sushi, if I say so myself), and see a platypus in real life (okay, so you learn as you go about which ones are realistic and which are not). This year, it’s to learn to cook with wine, go skeet shooting, and learn to change the oil in my car. These are all things I’ve intended to do in the past, but just never got around to it … and there’s something to be said for putting an intention out to the universe. I decided on these three (I’m sure I’ll come up with a couple more before Jan. 1, which is okay, since there’s plenty of time in a year), and posted them on Facebook. Within a day, I had an invitation to go skeet shooting up the valley, and another from a friend who wants to teach me how to change the oil in my car (apparently, there’s a way to teach same that involves cards and a drinking game, so I’m doubly intrigued). Without the resolutions, these would remain no more than nebulous ideas in the back of my head upon which I never ended up acting. Now, I may not achieve them all, every year, but even knocking a couple off the list feels like a success for which I can pat myself on the back – unlike the potentially life-altering resolutions of the past, which always promised to end in failure. It’s like they say in Alcoholics Anonymous, “Keep it Simple, Stupid”. So when you’re choosing resolutions to see you into the coming year, avoid the heavy material and the hot-button issues (like the friend-of-a-friend who swore on New Year’s Eve that if her most recent boyfriend broke up with her, too, that she was becoming a lesbian). Pick the small, do-able stuff that has stayed with you over the years, but that you never seemed to have time for – learn that new language, ride that horse, visit that place. Tell your friends about your resolutions – you’ll be shocked at how many will want to be a part of bringing them to fruition. And while you’re at it, have a safe, healthy and prosperous 2012.
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