What Are Your New Years Resolutions?

What is Your New Years Resolution

The celebration of the New Year is the oldest of all holidays. It was first observed in ancient Babylon about 4000 years ago. In the years around 2000 BC, Babylonians celebrated the beginning of a new year on what is now March 23, although they themselves had no written calendar.

 The tradition of the New Year’s Resolutions goes all the way back to 153 B.C. Janus, a mythical king of early Rome was placed at the head of the calendar.

With two faces, Janus could look back on past events and forward to the future. Janus became the ancient symbol for resolutions and many Romans looked for forgiveness from their enemies and also exchanged gifts before the beginning of each year. 

Now is the time of year when people start thinking about making New Year’s Resolutions for the New Year.  These goals often times center around personal health goals but they also should focus on emotional and interpersonal goals as well. 

Here are a few tips on how to keep your resolutions. 

The quickest New Years resolutions to be broken are usually quickly formed, poorly thought out goals.

7 is the Magic Number – George Miller, a 1950’s psychologist, proposed that we can only deal with 7 bits of information at any one time. Any more information and we need to group things into more memorable, manageable chunks. So when you create your New Year master plan, keep goals down to a manageable number and group similar areas.

Be Specific – A common mistake when setting goals, is in-sufficient detail. This can cause problems when we need to articulate these goals to work mates, life partners or even to ourselves. As an example of why this is important when goal setting, think of a house.

Keep New Years resolutions by writing your goals in enough detail for everyone to understand and agree what’s meant. So if your goal is to buy a house, put some flesh on the bones by saying your goal is to buy a 3 bedroom house, with garden, near work, etc.

Keep It Real - You are more likely to achieve realistic goals. That’s not to say you can’t shoot for the stars and pursue your dreams; break up your mega goal into smaller, more manageable mini goals, and you’re more likely to achieve your dream.

Tune Up The Details – Sometimes, its the small details that make the best plans fail.  Have a conversation with a friend, family member or loved one.  Have a conversation with them as though you already acheived your goals.  Get them to ask you how you did it.  If you want to find a new job, talk to the friend as though you found the job.  Get them to ask you how you found the job, who did you talk to, what changes you made to your resume etc.  This activity will help you fill in the gaps to your dream and take you from a big bare bones goal to adding the smaller detailed meat. 

My New Years Resolutions – I will turn 29 this year and I want to try to set a few things right before the big 30 rolls around.

1. Get into my bikini by my birthday (April 10).  This means more dedication to working out and avidly monitoring what I eat.  Phase 1 was losing the 40 – now I have about 25 or so more pounds to go.

2. Work on some introspection – Results you achieve oftentimes begin with what you put into the atmosphere.  If I keep getting the same results with various tasks, maybe it is me.  2009 is the time to flip the script. 

3. Fix some of my complaints – This goes hand in hand with #2.  I need to work on my relationships with people in general, not just boys.  Its time to let down that wall I put up a few years ago and let the sunshine in.

4.  Just Jump – if I can’t achieve certain things I have been wanting to do, this is the year to just jump.  I don’t want to walk into 30 worrying about things from my 20s.

5. Grow my hair to bra strap length.  I have been maintaining my natural for about 6 months now, and I think I am getting the hang of it.  Now its time to move my slightly below shoulder hair to the next level.

6. Grow P.O.S.H.- we have been running for about 7 months now and building a steady base.  2009  is the year to take us to the next level.  With the help from our readers we can make our way onto computer screens all across the world!! (insert evil laugh) lol.

What Are Your New Year’s Resolutions?

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