It's been three days since I wrote about New Years resolutions. How's it going you ask? Terribly. I went to the gym, ate reasonably (except for that giant bag of honey mustard pretzels which was a hunger monster impulse purchase at the grocery store), haven't used any of my money in an irresponsible manner, and haven't been slutty. Oh well, I guess it's to be expected. How many people actually stick with their New Years resolutions? Show of hands? Nobody? Yeah, that's what I thought. So here's my beef with New Years resolutions:


1. They tend to be massive unattainable goals. When I was younger, I resolved to not procrastinate every year. On anything. Ever. Clearly, that's not a realistic goal. I took a 4 month break from this very blog for fuck's sake. a blog. But I'm back on track and it's not because it's a new calendar year.


2. After you set these unattainable goals, you inevitably fail. You feel guilty about not sticking to your goal, and maybe you gorge on raw brownie batter for not going to the gym twice a day every day like you promised yourself or something... You feel down on yourself and disappointed that you couldn't achieve what you set out to do. Set the bar low. Or, if it's a limbo bar, very high. Shaq high.


3. You can never have just one (not talking about pringles, folks but yeah those too). Most people have more than one thing they'd like to fix in their lives so of course they pile them on and hope they go down one by one like dominoes. It is for this same reason that I don't trust politicians. OH, you're going to fix the economy, education, stop war, AND cure cancer? sure.



4. Shouldn't resolutions start on your birthday? That's your new year after all.


5. Mainly I resent the fact that tradition pushes people to reflect on themselves with the express goal of finding something wrong to fix. And maybe the goal was already there, but New Years puts a ticking time bomb on it. The most common New Years goals are open ended goals like losing weight, quitting smoking, reducing debt, spending more time with family etc. but I think in those cases the motivation has to come from strong self-determination, some sort of epiphany or an outside deadline. New Years just isn't enough.

6. Remember when New Years was just a fun time when you got to stay up after midnight and drink sparkling cider from a fancy glass like a grown-up? Now it's yet another holiday that has a ton of expectations attached to it. Let's just enjoy the fact that we get the day off work and get to hang with our friends and family.


Tangent: I have never made a resolution on Chinese New Year, but I wonder if Jewish people make resolutions on Rosh Hashanah or Muslims on umm... Islamic New Year (call me culturally unaware. whatever). Is that a thing? Anyone know?

I do have my own grand goals, but they have nothing to do with New Years. I hope I will achieve them one day but I can guarantee you I will never look back and think "wow, I'm so glad I resolved to do that thing that one New Years." Cheers to setting that limbo bar Shaq high.