“New Year New Me” and other BS
Raise your hand if you ever made a new year resolution that somehow slipped to the way-side around February or March.
This is NOT a personal failure. Change is HARD. And frankly, sustainable change doesn’t happen overnight, as much as we believe it might (or wish it would).
Resolutions are great, don’t get me wrong. The end of the year is a great time to pause and reflect. What worked for you? Where did you learn and grow? And what areas of your life do you want to strengthen?
When we set goals for ourselves, sometimes, we jump from 0-100 and set ourselves up for (unintentional) failure. If I want to cook more meals at home. Maybe the most sustainable path is to go from eating out 7 days a week to eating out every other day… then gradually adjust.
When creating goals, make them SMART!
Specific: State exactly what you want to accomplish.
Measurable: How will you demonstrate and evaluate how the goal is met?
Achievable: make it a challenging goal, in your ability to accomplish (AKA not 0-100)
Relevant: How is this goal aligned with your life/objectives?
Time-based: Set 1 or more target dates for when you will meet steps toward goal completion.
Additionally, the reason I believe the statement “New Year New Me” is total BS is because the word “New” implies that the object (you) never existed before.
Are you telling me that your whole life before this point was irrelevant, nonexistent, and vanished? I sure hope not! The ‘you’ that led you to this point in time most definitely has some valuable lessons, perspectives, habits and skills that surely will benefit you in the upcoming year(s).
What if this year, rather than dismissing and criticizing our past selves, we acknowledge them?
What if we accepted ourselves and showed appreciation for the steps we took that led us here? Yes, there may have been missteps or slip ups. Sure, there are probably some choices that in hindsight we could have made differently. But rather than living in the judgement and imposing the facts that we learned AFTER the event- can you radically accept your past and come to peace with the present?
This year, I challenge you to bring your ‘old’ self along for your journey of healing, transformation and growth. What a shame it would be to have your 2020 (and before) self vanish as the clock strikes midnight.
