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New year’s resolutions and I mix like oil and water. I abandoned the practice of dreaming up impossible goals (which is what most resolutions are) for myself a long time ago. Why? Because committing to resolutions almost always leads to breaking them. In the same sentence. Why start something you know you’ll abandon? Why bother making a commitment to a new idea or practice if it’s not what you really want?
Therein lies the rub. We want that fresh start, that energy we imagine starting over can bring. It seems like all our past sins and failures will disappear and we’ll be welcomed gleefully back into the Garden of Eden. The year is new; we feel like we should be new. Toss in that everyone seems to make resolutions and talk about them and you’ve got some pretty heavy duty peer pressure going on. Whether you engage or not, it’s happening all around you. At the very least it makes you think: am I missing out? Should I jump on board? Resolutions, after all, are actually about hope.
And that’s why I hate just throwing them into the wind like so many folks seem to do on January 1st. It’s not that I don’t want to hope for better times, I just despise seeing good intentions thrown away like dried up poinsettias after Christmas. Lose ten pounds, start jogging, walk the dog more, visit the family. Eat healthy. Those are all good things but they are so universally chosen and abandoned they seem pointless. I’ve done it a few times myself: committed to something new, then lapsed into disinterest and ennui. Was it because I was lazy or overcommitted? Had I simply never figured out what I really wanted in life?
I’ve decided the introspection itself is actually more important than the new activity or goal I hope will come from it. At least for me. Examining how I’m spending my time and whether I’m living wisely and purposefully is something I’m learning to value. Like so many of us who continue to live through more and more decades, I have realized only too recently that time never gives refunds. You can’t exchange it or swap it. A phrase like, “that’s two hours of my life I’ll never get back” is absolutely (and sadly) true.
So my new year’s resolutions have evolved in the last few years. I no longer adopt new, sufficiently pious habits that might impress my friends and family (I’m going to sponsor orphans in Siberia and go to church every single day!) Instead I use new year’s day (and any other day when I feel inclined) to notice what I am actually doing, then decide if those habits or activities align with what matters most. My top priorities are my family (including my pets) and personal growth. Any actions that serve those two principles are worthwhile; those that don’t are toast. Resolutions are now more about weeding out than taking on. They’re more about tweaking than making over.
Here’s a for instance. I’ve discovered that writing at the end of the day, after everything else is done, is not serving my personal or professional growth. I get up before five AM. Pushing off my creative endeavors to the very end of my waking hours yields lousy results. In fact, it usually yields no results since I’m often too tired to even begin after eight or nine o’clock. To improve my writing output, then, I don’t create a schedule for or designate a specific time to write. I just make sure never to push it to the bottom of my to-do list. Mission accomplished.
Another practice I initiated (last year) was born from the conviction that both me and my family need a secure financial future (a realization from a number of years before that). Money must flow into an investment vehicle if I want it to grow sufficiently to support us in our older years. I didn’t sit down to write a budget that itemized the spending of every penny. Instead I determined the largest amount I could spare each month and set it up as an auto-deposit to my account (some call that “paying yourself first.”) That way I serve my family’s financial future without having to remember it. I can’t fail!
Perhaps these practices aren’t much different from typical new year’s resolutions. Thinking of them in this way works so much better, however, because I’m focusing on actions I’m already taking. So in one way they are very different: I actually execute these resolutions. That brings joy.
And results.