Resolving Resolutions

As the year is coming to an end and as we’re entering a new decade, I’ve started to think about what my resolutions will be 2020. New year, new me — or so, that’s what we like to tell ourselves once the clock strikes twelve. However, New Year’s resolutions seem to become the butt of the joke when January 1st comes. It often feels like we only make them in order to break them in the end. This year I’ll eat healthier? Unlikely. This year I’ll hit the gym more? Maybe — but only after I’ve put it off for so long.

This is the exact same reason why I’ve long given up New Year’s resolutions. I never seem to accomplish any, so why bother trying at all? However, 2019 became the year I changed that, and this is my progress so far. 

START SIMPLE

I began writing a list of things I wanted to accomplish this year. I didn’t just have a New Year’s resolution— I had New Year’s resolutions. Among these goals, the simplest to do during were the following: one, have a better skincare routine (a.k.a. have fewer nights where I fall asleep with my makeup on) and two, begin writing in a journal consistently.

I wanted to begin with setting myself up for success by first striking out the things I believed I could do first. I knew that my desire to feel fulfilled and accomplished would see me through the year. 

DON’T BE DISCOURAGED

The killer of New Year’s resolutions is the ‘all or nothing’ mentality we have when dealing with them. We think that if we don’t begin eating healthier or hitting the gym exactly on January 1, these goals are ruined forever. However, these are just the first hurdles in the race. 

I didn’t open my new journal until the end of the second week of January, and I didn’t begin a strict (well, stricter than before) skincare routine until the end of the third! Even then, these resolutions didn’t run smoothly. I had to set an alarm to remind me to get up, go to the washroom, and wash my face, and I placed my journal by my bedside in order to force myself to write. Use whatever helpful tools you need in order to get you through the 2020 race. Soon enough, you’ll find these tasks becoming easier day by day with or without these tools in play.

NEW YEAR 

As of December, I’ve finished one entire journal and am starting a new one, and I have yet to sleep with my makeup on. However, these two goals were just tip of my resolutions iceberg. There’s more I want to have accomplished in the year, but I had to remind myself that I have to take it one step at a time. 

“Just get it done within the year!” That is my guiding motto as I make my new list of resolutions — even if I only start eating healthy in October. 

NEW ME

New Year’s resolutions are rarely ‘one time-big time’ things; more often they are habits we want to form in order to better ourselves or make life easier. Habits do not form overnight  (actually, they form within 21 days), so don’t beat yourself up if you complete your resolution in 3 months rather than in 3 days. 

At the beginning of 2019, I came across a quote that said, “some years are for growing, but this one’s for blooming,” and I take that message to heart. 2020 will be the year I will bloom — or at least that’s what I’ve made as my New Year’s resolution.

• 2020
• habits
• HCCLU
• New Year
• new years resolutions