Why New Year's Resolutions are a Really Bad Idea

It is likely that every human being who uses a calendar has at one time or another made a New Year’s Resolution. Most of us make one or more every year as January 1st comes near. What most don't realize is that New Year’s Resolutions are very often huge and costly mistakes.

The things that make these resolutions seem like such a good idea are actually the very reasons why they are not. If we look at success methodology, specifically as it relates to realizing goals, we recall that in order for a goal to be met it must have a specific time terminus. That is to say, we have to have a date or time upon which the goal is to be completed. New Year’s Resolutions have a starting date, to be sure, but rarely have a finish-point in mind. This is more often than not a guarantee of failure before we even begin.

Next, because these resolutions have a specific starting point, they give us an excuse to continue our bad behavior right up to the very last minute—until the “New Year”. The problem with this type of thinking is that it demonstrates our lack of commitment from the outset. If we were truly interested in changing something, and had made the necessary decision to do so, we wouldn’t need to wait until the New Year to do it. Remember, truly making a decision means we have cut ourselves off from all other possibilities. We cannot have success without a firm decision to do something specific, and we cannot have a decision if we leave ourselves “outs”, even just for that last few days or hours before the turn of a calendar page.

Also, New Year’s Resolutions fail to compensate for our primary weakness to begin with; they do not in any way alleviate our inability to sustain commitment. True change requires dedication, discipline and reinforcement. Simply declaring an arbitrary date as the day our lives will change cannot ever make it so, and in some ways actually sabotages our ability to effect true change because we wind up believing that this date carries some “magic” that simply is not there. January 1st is no more powerful a day than August 18th or March 7th. Because we assign an unrealistic value to that particular date we surreptitiously let ourselves off the hook, believing that our goal will materialize on its own somehow without us having to practice the techniques of success.

New Year’s Resolutions reinforce our inherent expectation of failure, and provide a ready-made excuse for us once we have forsaken our goal. We know going in that we’ve made and broken any number of resolutions before, and so we do not hold much hope (despite what we may say or even believe) that this year will be any different. When we go in expecting to fail, for whatever reason, failure will be our outcome. And because we have never succeeded in the past, we let ourselves off the hook automatically for this failure as well. This is the classic self-fulfilling prophecy complete with built-in spin doctor, convincing us that backsliding is simply not our fault. We were doomed to fail from the beginning because we always have, and so there was nothing we could do about it…that is the lie of the New Year’s Resolution.

By far, though, the most damaging thing that comes from these failed attempts is that they are, indeed, failures. From the point of view of self-confidence (which is the key ingredient to any sustainable success no matter the goal), crashing and burning on yet another success goal is psychological poison. It is far better to forego making a resolution that we expect will fail (and which invariably will) than it is to simply view the start of a new year as a blessing of renewed opportunity, without assigning any specific force to it otherwise. That is not to say that we should not risk failure; rather, it should be our purpose to only risk failure when we have done the necessary legwork to assure our likely success.

As a rule, only make a New Year’s Resolution when you've planned in advance to succeed. This includes making a true decision to create whatever change you desire in your life. That process begins the moment the decision is honestly arrived at, and not on a future date (because deciding to change later is not a decision at all). Your change must be permanent in your mind, and your results must be measurable. This would include some form of date upon which you can assess the success of your actions; a deadline for completing a particular project or saving a specific amount of money, for example. Your resolution must be action oriented as well. It is not enough to say “I will lose ten pounds this year”; you have to add “by eating salad three days per week and joining a gym which I will visit every other day for the next six months”. If your resolution does not contain a specific path, it has no teeth. Simply declaring a goal does not bring it to fruition. Like everything else, successfully “resolving” your issue requires a plan and some effort on your part.

It is admirable and courageous to make the decision to change, and if the start of a new year creates within you the impetus to do so then by all means utilize that for the sake of momentum. But remember that the turning of the calendar does not remove from you the need to follow proven success principles, and resolving to change without such a commitment is more likely to result in further damage than it is to create true and lasting change.

Warm wishes for a prosperous—and wholly successful—New Year!