New Year parties and all sorts of New Year celebrations are often a moment we take to revise our past year and make resolutions for the next. Not everybody makes the summarizing of the past year - except if they have to give a speech of any sort - and from those who do make resolutions, only a handful keep them. I'm one of the large flock that don't (specially because once the hangover is over, I forget what the hell did I made resolutions about :-P). Then there's people who don't even bother with resolutions and just toss, drink the sparkly and wake up the next day like it is just another day.
Well, we are not accountable to anyone for our resolutions and whether we keep them or not, and if we are not taking them seriously, what's the point in keeping them?
Resolutions are kind of like the Mission and the Vision of companies: they are supposed to have these, and probably a group of business administrators or a hired consulting team could come up with some great sounding Mission and Vision, print it out in cards, banners and calendars, but then what? So you could also write your resolutions down, you could make wallpapers for your computers and many devises to keep them in mind, but if you still don't do a thing about them, what's the point of them?
Like with companies, the resolutions of many people are basically for show off or shallow reasons. "I'll get fit so that my ex sees what's he's /she's missing", "I'll buy myself a newer car", "I'll travel to [insert currently fashionable destination]", "I'll get myself a new boyfriend/girlfriend", "I'll make more friends", "I'll reach 1 million followers in Twitter", "I'll get rich". Not all of these depend on you, so even if you wanted to do something, you can't really do much - you can't work your ass into getting a boyfriend or a girlfriend, as you can't make others fall in love with you, and trust me, going out more or spending more money on clothes, make up, hair and all sorts of personal advertizing don't do the trick. May get you attention, but it's not guaranteed to get you love. Some resolutions are not resolutions, but wishes. In this sense, it's interesting how people resource often to RE-solutions instead of Solutions. It's easier to wish upon a firework-star, bubbly in hand for a situation to go take care of itself, then sitting down to wait when will it happen.
This year I'm using a paper agenda again - a gift from my thesis mate. It's a wonderfully bound book, so of course I'm using it! I'm going old school again! - and there already started jotting down my notes, and also tasks, resolutions, hopes, dreams and loosely sketched plans for the future. There are my resolutions, but also suggestions for Solutions. For example, let's say... that I'm overweight - or I perceive myself as such, and let's say I'm not suffering from an eating disorder -. So:
Problem: Overweight
Resolution: Lose X pounds in one year/ Get to X weight by December
Solutions: In January I'll start walking more, Next month I'll drink more water, Next month I'll climb stairs...
(Honestly, I couldn't come up with any better example, but the point is that you not only realize something you want to change and make the resolution to change it, but also schedule it in easy steps and accumulate actions, or try out solutions until getting the result you want. Started with the example of smoking but that got messy! Though technically you can decide each month you will smoke 1/12 less than your current amount. I wouldn't know. When I stopped smoking was because my then boyfriend was smoking my cigs, so it was a matter of expenses versus profit. I'm an economist, so what do you expect?)
So this 2012, are you staying with the Resolutions or will you strip the "re" and come up the rest of the year with the Solutions? ^_^
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