New Years Resolution

New Years resolutions… a decision that as of January 1st of the New Year, one will dedicate themselves to lose weight, save more money, be nicer, be more independent, be more giving, _________ … you fill in the blank. A New Years resolution is whatever that behavior change is we feel is needed to make us better people. Why it’s necessary to use January 1st as the starting point for that, I don’t know.
Over the last month I realized I was smoking cigars way too much. At least a couple a day. My first gut reaction was , starting 1/1/09, I am going to cut back…than I started thinking how ridiculous that was. I recognized that I had developed a bad, unhealthy habit and instinctively I thought of using the New Years resolution to improve the situation. Seriously? I know it’s bad for me and rather than adjust when I realized the habit was bad, I was coming up with a socially acceptable way to delay the change. If history was a precursor for how this years resolution was going to be, it was doomed for failure anyway. I think in part because by setting a specific future date for making a change to improve some behavior, I was reducing the significance of the need for the change. If something needs a resolution, why wait? I didn’t wait till January 1st. I haven’t had a cigar in 6 days. Before anyone starts thinking crazy…my goal was to moderate my habit, not extinguish it. On January 2nd, I’m going to like up a stogie and celebrate ;-)

Happy and successful 2009 to you all!
Steve