New Year, Same You

As a species we celebrate the arrival of the New Year. A night of debauchery and intoxication serves as a cathartic cleansing of sorts and provides enlightenment to the individual, minutes prior to the year’s final countdown.

To the pragmatic, this is simply the revolution of the Earth around our solar system’s center. Amazing yes (it’s a hell of an achievement), but it’s a yearly occurrence that will continue to take place until the Earth ceases to exist. To the idealist, however, this annual phenomenon results in an existential breakthrough that inspires the penning of a list of his/her inadequacies.

These might include (but are not limited to) alterations to one’s physical appearance, minute changes to one’s work and social life (i.e. arriving on time to work/school, consuming less alcohol) and inevitably adopting, at least for the first weeks of January, the lifestyle mantra of carpe diem.

Now this isn’t to say it’s not healthy and productive to set positive goals and commitments for one. But why wait until a New Year? Why put off the challenge? If a person wants to lose weight, learn to dance or engage in less gossip, then the rotational placement of the Earth around the Sun is irrelevant.

Granted, it’s fruitful to want to make positive changes in your life, but it is in prolonging the taking of action that ultimately ends up sabotaging one’s plan. You see, if you’ve come to the realization that you want to lose 15 pounds then there’s no reason to wait until the New Year to achieve this or to begin paving the way to achieving this goal.

The problem with New Year’s resolutions is that most people end up abandoning theirs by mid-February — if they even start at all. This may result in feelings of failure and inadequacy that greatly diminishes the individual’s self-esteem and motivation for much of the year. I don’t know about you, but I’d hate to start off the year with strike one. It’s much more difficult to complete a grocery list of monumental changes, as opposed to small, gradual ones throughout the year.

So stop your wishing, praying and hoping and take action. Commence your metamorphosis today and not on January of 2013. This is the present, and that is what counts.

Top ten New Year’s Resolutions according to usa.gov
-Drink Less Alcohol
-Eat Healthy Food
-Get a Better Education
-Get a Better Job
-Get Fit
-Lose Weight
-Manage Debt
-Manage Stress
-Quit Smoking
-Reduce, Reuse, and Recycle
-Save Money
-Take a Trip
-Volunteer to Help Others