I'm finding myself having trouble with new years resolutions this year. I've always liked new years, and making resolutions. I love the idea of sweeping away old habits and improving oneself by developing new ones. I love the introspection and self examination making goals for the new year can bring. I love looking forward to to the possibilities and opportunities of a new year. This year, I'm having trouble, though.
One question I'm struggling with is what manner is best for making new years resolutions. I've traditionally followed the pattern of building one resolution in four areas of life: social, physical, spiritual, and intellectual/professional. Reading Baumeister and Tierney's Willpower I began to question this strategy. They suggest that one should limit themselves to only one new years resolution, as having several causes them to distract from one another.
This doesn't seem unreasonable, and as I'm looking at things I want to do this year they all seem to roughly fit under a sort of unifying umbrella. I've been thinking about creating a resolution this year that's more of a mission or values statement and peppering a few specific goals under that. I'm not that interested in having a non-specific focus, though, and prefer to focus on the quantifiable and observable to something I can convince myself is motivating or working without having anything to look at to support or refute those assertions.
I'm also wondering if this is a good year for resolutions at all. Much of this year will be just transitioning through larger changes in life that fit in to broader goals and plans of mine and my family. I'll be starting my new job, finishing my associates degree and certifying as an MLT. All of these plans are probably what I'll really be focusing on, and don't really require any new goals or resolutions for 2016 to progress. So to all of my friends, should I make resolutions this year? If so, how?
