Planning on a New Year’s resolution (or two) for 2025? Here are some thoughts from a column written by Lyna Bentahar for The New York Times:
Does it feel like there’s something gauche — maybe a little anachronistic — about New Year’s resolutions? They run counter to the idea that we should accept who we are. That we should give ourselves grace. “Do you have any New Year’s resolutions?” It’s a question that asks someone to believe they are inadequate.
And I get that. My colleague Melissa Kirsch argues that resolutions shouldn’t be so grand that we set ourselves up to fail. Maybe it’s better to admit we won’t improve in the new year — a dose of realism with our Champagne.
No thanks. I love resolutions, and I love hearing what work other people choose to do on themselves. I think there’s a way to be better without believing you are deficient. A New Year’s resolution is an opportunity to give myself a sense of accomplishment. A gift to future me.
I’ve begun writing an annual list of things I want to do in the new year. This morning, I want to write my resolutions with you — and hopefully convince you to craft your own ideas for self-improvement.
That subject — “self-improvement” — is a bookstore section with a million entries. And real scholarship has looked at how people change, or try to. There are techniques that work for anyone hoping to make a change. But for me, I follow three rules.
It has to be measurable. “Eat at home more” might be a resolution, but it’s vague enough that you’ll never be accountable. “Eat at home five times a week” is a resolution.
It has to be realistic. There’s no way I can exercise for an hour every day for a month. Life gets in the way, and everyone needs rest. But exercise 10 times in a month? That’s definitely something I can do.
You have to want to do it. The truth is, I hate cardio and strength training. It wouldn’t be any good for me to write those down as resolutions, because they’re just chores. But I love yoga. It’s fun and relaxing. I feel accomplished and confident when I become more flexible.
Here’s what I’m writing on my paper:
Do yoga for an hour 10 times in one month.
Don’t bite your nails for two consecutive months.
See the dentist twice this year.
Paint a painting.
Ride a roller coaster.
Make a new friend. (This one’s going to be a hard one.)
Then I fold the list up and put it away.
That’s right. It’s gone from my life. I don’t look at it until the end of the year. This isn’t homework. There’s no final exam. A new start is more like extra credit.
If I made my list right, at the end of the year, I’ll find that I accomplished a lot of what I set out to do. Not everything, of course — I’ve tried to quit biting my nails before, but I haven’t yet crossed it off.
Yet my resolutions usually work out. Why? Taking the time to think about what you want to do and who you want to be is the hardest part. Writing it down sets you up to be mindful of yourself and your goals. The satisfaction of crossing your resolutions off at the end of the year (or the self-reflection about why you weren’t able to) will motivate you to keep improving.
Best of all, there’s no pressure. We have an entire year to work on them. In fact, I can cross off something from my previous list right now: Publish an article in The New York Times.
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