Is it New Year’s resolution or New Life’s resolution?

Photo by ianturton2

Yes it’s that time of the year when people start talking about making their minds up on resolutions they will make for the coming year. No doubt, the web is buzzing hot with chatter on the topic.

One thing I always ask myself when people talk about New Year resolutions is “why do they call them New Year resolutions and not New Life resolutions?”

Yes I know it’s because you are resolute to change a habit or start a new one at the beginning of the upcoming year but it sounds as if that resolution is bound by only a year and not a lifetime. If my hunch is right I think it that this is also a hidden Psychological caveat.

By thinking of it in terms of a year and not a lifetime, sometimes people are subconsciously bound to think or ‘self-talk’ a way out of their commitment.

It’s as if we are subconsciously saying to ourselves through the little devil on our shoulders: “Don’t worry it’s only for a year and as it happens, it very probably won’t even last half as long. So go on, you might as well commit to it but rest assured that it will not bind you forever.”

Popular resolutions:

I wasted a little bit of my time to research this up. It was a waste because I was already dead sure what the most popular resolutions are and I was right.

I know you know them just as well. Here they go in no special order:

1. Give more time to Family

2. Get fit/lose weight

3. Quit smoking/drinking

4. Get out of debt

5. enjoy life more

6. learn something new

7. Get organized

These are super popular for a good reason – they are very common behavioral patterns, restrictions and habits that affect the many.

Lack of quality time to spend with family, debt, an unorganized life and an unhealthy lifestyle are a patent of modern life.

Curious resolutions:

Writing about this will make me go slightly out of point with this post’s title but I guess you want to hear this so I’m sure you’d excuse the excursion.

As I was wasting my time looking up popular resolutions, I was also tempted to Google up strange, unusual and utterly silly ones.

Here are some which I took note of:

1. “Exercise my feet and undo the damage inflicted by years of sitting on my ass.”

2. Give up sex just to prove a point (and which point I would ask?)

3. Reliving childhood: As in making sounds with the armpit and belching the alphabet.

4. Learning a useless skill (!)

5. Some even argued that since picking up new habits seems to be statistically futile why not pick up a new vice?

Suggested resolutions:

OK let me return full circle to my point of departure. New year’s vs. New Life’s resolution.

Here’s my 2c worth of suggestion. The pattern behind the most popular resolutions seems to be reactive rather than proactive. It is mostly resorting to sort out a long unattended to area of our lives: Health, lifestyle, family etc.

But rather than sorting things out, which should obviously still be encouraged, it is a wiser choice to be resolute about changing those aspects of your self that are responsible for the problem in the first place.

Here are a few recommendations:

1. Become more aware and present in your life. Give more attention to your aspirations and dreams. Take charge of your life by being conscious that it’s only you who is responsible of realizing your dreams. If you believe it, so it will be.

2. Cultivate loving kindness and compassion. Reach out more. Be aware of other people’s needs. Take the opportunity to look at life beyond your immediate needs and it will open up in ways it never did before.

3. Take more time to be free from the merry-go-round. This is often misunderstood. Sometimes people take free time from whatever they are doing to fill it up completely with something else. They shift time instead of making time to chill out, slow down and step outside the fast lane.

4. Count your blessings. Literally! Open up a text editor document and keep note of every blessed good thing that comes your way no matter how small. Soon you will realize how marvelous life can be.

5. Focus on your priorities. Revise the order of things in your life. Sort out what really counts and focus on it. Keep it on top and keep it in sight.