A few days before January 1 hits, the big question comes in: What are possible New Year’s resolutions? With December flying by and the last day of 2017 inching near, people constantly think about where their lives are currently and how they want to change them.
New Year’s resolutions are meant to be important and meaningful, but no one ever talks about them after a month into the new year. New Year’s resolutions are promises and goals people make to start doing something good or stop doing something bad for the first day of year, but rarely remember the rest of the year.
Nearly 4,000 years ago, ancient Babylonians created the idea of New Year’s resolution and is still used today. The Babylonians made promises to their gods that they will pay their debts and always honor their crowned king. These promises are what formed their tradition of resolutions, passing throughout history, from ancient Rome to the early Christians to modern society.
What makes New Year’s resolution different from regular goals is that the main motivation to go through with them is to be a better and changed person or have better results for the upcoming year. Resolutions can be starting to eat healthy and losing weight, quitting bad habits, studying harder to improve grades, and even fun ones that are simply for pleasure such as setting a goal to travel somewhere in the world once a month for the next year.
The biggest problem of New Year’s resolution is going through with them. Individuals make many goals in their life and tell themselves that they will do a specific thing, but they usually don’t end up going through with them. In fact, 80% of New Year’s resolution fail by February, and only 8% of people continue achieving their goals after the year passed.
It’s very easy to lose motivation and interest into the goals people want to achieve. Sometimes people find they resolutions childish or impossible, and push them to the side; other times they just forget that they even made a promise to themselves.
Not only is motivation important when it comes to promises we want to keep, but the effort that is put into them to make them come true. If someone’s resolution has to do with eating healthier or being more fit, they shouldn’t just depend on their school to provide them healthy lunches. They must organize their time to make space to go to the gym or buy food to make their own healthy dinner.
It is important for people to remember that resolutions are accomplished for themselves and not for others. When resolutions are made for good reasons, individuals begin to feel good about themselves. People who surround themselves with other people that are good influences on them and understanding when their stress is overwhelming, they can complete resolutions on how to be a happier person for the year.
New Year’s resolutions don’t always have to be goals that people set that that they never took the time to consider and didn’t act on. Anyone can have New Year’s resolution if dedication is put into it, and it’s remembered with them for the whole year. New Year’s resolution’s can have meaning and a purpose, like they were meant to be, and can be continued for more than one year.
