I don't believe in New Year's resolutions.

It's that time of year again: when everyone starts making promises to themselves to do something different. Work out more, procrastinate less. Keep a closer eye on finances, be more spontaneous, maintain a 4.0 GPA. Volunteer for a cause, help a person in need. Become generally more attractive, more healthy, more responsible, and most importantly, more happy.

And then after a few days, weeks, or (if you're really desperate) months you start to lose momentum, and eventually just fall back into your old habits. i.e. being generally less attractive, less healthy, less responsible, and less happy than you intended to be.

And what have you gained? Probably not a whole lot.

I think the problem isn't that people set goals that are unrealistic, but rather that they're setting these goals half-heartedly, and for the wrong reasons. Rather than trying to improve themselves for the sake of their happiness and well being, they take the ideal version of themselves and promise to become that person because they were too lazy/unmotivated/busy/distracted to do it beforehand. And they think that because it's a new year, everything will be different all of a sudden. That it's some sort of chance to "start over."

But it's just another day. And aside from all the hype and celebration, nothing really changes. So this whole "New Year's resolution" thing is just something that makes people think they're going to improve their lives without actually having to put forth the effort to do it.

I'm constantly trying to better myself as a person. I try to be kinder, healthier, more confident, more generous, more courageous, more everything. But this is something I do and think about all year. It has nothing to do with dates and new beginnings. It's really not even about setting goals and working toward them. It's about waking up each day and doing it all better than I did the previous day.

So really, I don't have any New Year's resolutions. Because there's nothing that I want to do that I'm not already in the process of doing. There's nothing about me that I want to change that I'm not already trying to change. And so far it's all been working out pretty well.

xo