Resolutions. New Years or Otherwise.

Resolutions has always seemed artificial and forced to me, especially the New Year resolution. It seemed contrived because there is nothing in the human behavioral set of rules that says that you have to renew yourself and create these resolutions at the beginning of the calendar year.

First, because the calendar is a contrived mechanism created to make humans able to track time in an easier manner. The fact that we are following a solar calendar versus a lunar calendar makes the yearly resolution seem even more contrived.

The act of writing and proclaiming a resolution is contrived. Why is it that we feel the need to declare our intentions in a formal way and written in a formal list. I know people who are very formal about the idea, saying that this is a way to create a mechanism for our friends to hold us accountable to what we had pledged. Indeed, if this is the case, when does this not make our free will and discipline a joke? If we cannot have the discipline to hold fast to our will then won’t we have greater issues with ourselves than just a resolution?

Let us now look at the motivation for the resolution. Is it a means to declare to our friends and loved ones what our intention is or is it a way for us to call attention to what we are saying for selfish reasons? Is the resolution just a means for publicly touting our own virtues? Is this not just some form of bragging about our own purity of purpose? I don’t need to let the world know I plan on abstaining from alcohol, I declare it to receive the rewards of being so honest and forthright in the most public way possible.   

Indeed, doesn’t our promise to our self to do whatever it is that we wish to aspire to mean more to ourselves rather than to others? If that is indeed the case, then the public declaration of the resolution is just so much public show of our virtue and purity. Generally this is not a strong basis for discipline and resilience. Hence the failure rate in upholding these resolutions.

Make a resolution to yourself for yourself, let no one else know. Your conscience will be clearer and you are truer to yourself. Making the resolution public is pointless. Holding to your resolution to your own standards while no one is looking is what we need to aim for.