Relax! It's Ditch New Year's Resolutions Day

© fotofabrika / Dollar Photo Club

Did you start 2016 with a list of resolutions? Did you promise yourself that this would be the year you'd write that book, run that marathon, take that much-needed vacation?

I think it's human nature to look at a fresh calendar with optimism and motivation to make more of the next 365 days. But most of us can stick to these resolutions for only a few weeks, maybe a couple of months. That's human nature too.

Bad habits are hard to break, and a lot of the resolutions we make are related to bad habits: Quit smoking. Lose weight. Start exercising. Spend less. Save more. We've all made these promises to ourselves at one time or another. And we've all broken them. Still, when the new year rolls around we start the cycle again.

But I have good news for you. Today is Ditch New Year’s Resolutions Day. According to the folks who put together the Days of the Year, January 17th is the day when most of us give up on our resolutions. So if you've been wavering on your new commitments you have permission to throw them out the window right now.

I confess I didn't make any resolutions this year. I started the year off with a stomach bug and wasn't paying attention to much else. When I finally recovered it didn't seem important. But last year I wrote a wonderful list of resolutions and posted it on this blog on January 3. 

I'm looking at it now for the first time since, and I'm astounded by what I see. My long list of goals to write more, lose weight, control social media time suck, etc. fell by the wayside shortly after I put them in writing. Not one has been realized, nor one issue resolved. In fact, I could recycle the list for 2016.

But I’m not. My only resolution for 2016 is to go easy on myself, to make the most of this year without the added pressure of resolutions, because I've come to the conclusion that it's in my nature to not stick to these kinds of things. 

What about you? Did you make any new year’s resolutions? How's that working for you?

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