There is always so much talk about New Year’s Resolutions and we break most of them within hours after we make them. Just what does that say about us? I suspect only that we are human. It seems like a good idea to reflect on why we make New Year’s Resolutions, and then maybe we can figure out why we break them.
Why we make them
Almost all of us have a great desire to do better. We want to improve our lives, be thinner, be nicer, care more. The desire is sincere. The wanting it to be different is what drives so many New Years Resolutions. As much as I hesitate to point this out, we did spend a whole bunch of time last year talking about living in the present. Much of what drives us to make New Years Resolutions is our inability to do just that.
Here and now is nice and everything, but there must be somewhere, sometime that will be better, nicer, richer, happier or whatever. The biggest problem we have is our inability to stop and look at what we have right not – where we are right now – and who is next to us right now. Maybe we would be better off if our New Year’s Resolution would be to be thankful for what we have and where we are right this minute.
Why we Break Them
So – we are driven to make New Year’s Resolutions. Why are we driven to break them? If we think about it, the reason is basically the same. With our drive to be better in the future than we have been in the past we have totally neglected to see the NOW. But now definitely catches up with us. While we want to be thinner or nicer or whatever, all of the things in the present that get in our way of making that happen haven’t gone away. They are still there, staring us in the face (like that wonderful cake at my recent family baptism). Until we stay in the present in order to appreciate what we have and learn how to change what we don’t like, the future we want is only a dream.
To become different we have to embrace who we are now. A little bit of irony.
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