Don’t Write A New Year's Resolution

By Isabelle Garreaud on December 28, 2015

Every year, we get the same old question: What is your new year’s resolution?

Some people make theirs personal, but a lot of times you hear the same cliché statements of “I’m going to go to the gym every week,” “study harder,” “save money,” “quit smoking/drinking/habit,” and so forth. Unless you are actually disciplined enough to keep that up for 365 days a year, it will most likely be broken and your resolution again for the next year.

Why set yourself up for the disappointment? You can’t break a resolution if you don’t make one. It is always good to improve yourself or your situation, but you don’t have to wait until January 1 to do that. People feel compelled to spit out a resolution every New Year because that is what is expected, that’s the tradition, but most of us either forget about the promise we made, or only do it for a short period of time. No one can predict how your year will go so don’t make a promise you don’t know if you can keep.

Instead of following the New Year’s resolution tradition and the tradition of failing to keep that promise, make a list of all the things you are looking forward to. It is basically the opposite of a resolution: you make a list of things you know will happen rather than what you hope will happen.

Write everything no matter how big or small. Expecting a package on January 5? Put it on the list. Taking a class you really wanted to take? Put it on the list. Have planned vacations? Birthday celebrations? Parties? Concerts? Put it on the list.

The things you can add to your list are endless, so make your list as long as you like. Then you can hang it in your room or glue it to your planner, wherever you want so you can remind yourself that this will be a good year!

Image via Isabelle Garreaud

After you are done, you will have an entire list of things to look forward to for the New Year! This beats a list of things you may not even want to do. You are not going to go to the gym every day for an entire year if you dread going to it in the first place, and you end up feeling bad about yourself for once again not committing to it.

If you really want to improve yourself, you can start at any point during the year, when you are actually ready to commit. Start off the year in a good mood, as you will get excited about all the things you put on your list.

What are you looking forward to in 2016?

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