Thursday 2 January 2014

6 Reasons to Make a New Year Resolution

As a year comes to an end you fall into a spell of introspection, leading often to a feeling of dismay. All achievements in retrospect feel slight and unsatisfactory. You had big dreams, big plans, and 365 days to accomplish your desires; so many days. As it happens, you cannot account for the days, they went too fast, you think, and you were too busy taking care of unforeseen situations otherwise known as distractions.

With a new year however comes a second (or hundred) chance at realising unfulfilled ambitions. You are in a state of ambivalence. You mourn for the lost time and rejoice for the gift of beginnings. In that state of half joy-half sorrow, you device a strategy to seize the year, a guide for the coming days, a grand idea to turn around your life, a transformational agenda itemised as vows, dos and don’ts.

A New Year resolution is a penitence for previous shortcomings and a statute of a new beginning. Its popularity though is waning. The resolution, drawn up in January, has a reputation for remaining unfulfilled in December thereby establishing a cycle of hope and dismay, and throwing this long held tradition into disrepute. Despite the jinx, a resolution is absolutely necessary, as you would see in these six points.

1. A New Year resolution will quicken the process of getting over past failures. It comes with it a sense of a fresh start. Goodbye 2013, viva 2014! A new month, a new year, a new notepad with the date written on the first page, new resolutions, goodbye to mediocrity, cheers to hard work, a new life and a new, improved you.

2. As more people disclaim the resolution, it would be pretentious to act like you are not into resolutions. More people than are willing to admit are discreetly making at least a mental note for self-improvement.

3. It is only a few days into January, still early to predict social media trends. Perhaps posting one’s wedding pictures on Facebook would become outdated. It may become fashionable to update friends on your progress with a New Year resolution. Thus, a post would read: Resolution No. 3: sleep four hours a day. Accomplished! Probably a lie.

4. You will get a chance to make the exclusive list of super humans who are able to accomplish a fraction of the items on their list.

5. If you fail to make the list, you will be proven to be human. An aggregation of resolution would show how delusional your race is. It is human to lie to its kind and to itself.

6.  It is necessary if only to reckon with the new year, to acknowledge its arrival, and to sustain the tradition of New Year resolution.


 Now that you are convinced, here are a few tips on making a New Year resolution.
  • Be unrealistic. Make a wish, then, make a list, numbered at least one to ten. The more imaginary, the better. Set sprawling, vague goals like, ‘I want to be a nicer person’ do not bother with the how to accomplish the goals.
 
  • Set long term goals. Do not break them down into tiny, doable details. Rather than purposing to read 30 pages of fiction daily, write that you will finish the Complete Works of Shakespeare in 2014. You will feel less guilty about your inefficiency. Leave the agonising till December.
 
  • Be perfect at the end of the year, you will be humbler and kinder, add or lose weight, eat more fruits and vegetables, read more, write more, sleep less, read the Bible daily, quit watching E! watch NTA more, agonise more over the state of the nation, vote in the next general elections (you will need to be determined a year early), etc.
 
  • Be creative. Avoid old language especially if you are trying for seven years to break habits like smoking. A New Year resolution is about finding new words and zest for old problems; novelty takes precedence over resolve.
 
  • Check online for more information. For best results, vary the key words as often as you search: top seven tips on making a New Year resolution; guide to making a resolution; how to start a new year; a dummy’s guide to a perfect year.

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