On New Year’s restrospectives and resolutions
I almost don’t want to add to the mess of blog posts on the topic of New Year’s, they tend to be a bit exhausting to read not to mention depressing if you haven’t published a best seller while having a child, been mentioned by Time magazine with the word “most” in the title, or scaled some other mountain.
I hope 2009 was a great year for you but if it wasn’t I’ll go out on a limb here and say you’re probably in pretty good company. For myself I’d have to label it as interesting and educational but I’d just as soon not repeat it, thank you very much. And while I could write up a list of the most popular posts from this site (How to get motivated quickly tops the list) I’d rather save that for its first birthday on Feb. 20th.
Which brings me to resolutions. I’ve nothing against them but I don’t do them on New Year’s. For the winter solstice on Dec. 21 I write up three things I want to exit from my life (like feeling anxious) and three things I want to come into my life (confidence). There’s a whole silly ritual involving cocoa powder and bonfires that I’ll save for later and I’m pretty sure that the powers of the Universe won’t object too much if want to try it in January instead of December. Chinese New Year usually comes around fairly quickly and I think all that red and gold, not to mention the dragons, helps get me a little more motivated. And then my birthday comes in a few more weeks which is also an excellent time to set goals and new trajectories – at least for me! So there are a great many fresh starts in about a six week period and New Year’s Day is one of the least interesting!
I’m also a big fan of picking an otherwise unnoteworthy day, devoid of public or personal holidays, to do something really big like stop smoking or start training for a marathon. Not as an excuse to delay mind you, but rather so you really have something to celebrate later that is truly personal and not attached to something else that appears bigger. Would you rather tell the story of how you quit on New Year’s Day or how you quit on January 17th?
If you do have a big goal in mind for either 2010 or another annual cycle, I highly recommend reading This Year I Will…: How to Finally Change a Habit, Keep a Resolution, or Make a Dream Come True
