What's in a resolution? To have one or not?
Closing in on the year and bidding adieu to 2023, let's talk about notion of a resolution.
It is truly hard to believe we are only days away from 2024. What’s also hard for me to believe is my birthday is just a away on the 31st. I was born on the very last day of the end of the year, a New Year’s Eve baby as I am called. When I was young, I absolutely hated being born on this day because it felt as though I had to wait so long until it was my turn to be celebrated, to receive gifts and a party. Plus, growing up in New York City, it is a time during the Winter season when it was bitter cold, snowy and icy and just simply not a fun time to be having a birthday party. Often, it was also overshadowed by Christmas and the world watching the ball drop in the middle of Times Square in New York City. If you do not know that tradition, a lit up mechanical ball would start to lower at approximately minutes to midnight to count down the close of the current year and to celebrate the next one. While I lived in NYC for most of my life, I may have only experienced that celebratory madness in person only once, just to say I did it. Well I pretty quickly realized it wasn’t a tradition that I was going to uphold. I am not one for large crowds, in the end.
At the turn and start of the new year, January 1, it is culturally popular to ask the question, “What is your new year’s resolution?” And the truth is that I have yet to meet someone who has actually committed to one throughout the year. I asked ChatGPT about the origins of this tradition and apparently it dates back to “ancient times, around 4,000 years ago, when the Babylonians celebrated the New Year with a festival called Akitu, which typically lasted 12 days. During this time, they made promises to the gods to pay off debts and return borrowed items, believing that keeping these resolutions would bring favor from the gods for the coming year.” In modern times, resolutions are about setting goals and commitments for the self improvement and to set positive intentions for the coming year.
I find there is a bitter sweetness to creating resolutions. In theory it is a lovely promise to aspire to, because it is easy to make them, but challenging to stay consistent and committed. I know for me, there are distractions in life and obligations that feel like they take precedence. Because the resolutions, the promises we make, the goals we set requires us to put ourselves first— our health (the mental, physical, emotional and even spiritual) before anyone or anything else and that is hard to do.
Resolutions may be looked at as ritual acts of change and a part of building our arsenal of resilience to manage daily life. I like to propose certain parameters for keeping a resolution digestible and doable. For starters, make it fun. It should be that ritualistic thing you look forward to. I’ll give you an example, I absolutely LOVE the taste of coffee, it is my sacred morning ritual. When I wake up, I head straight to the kitchen, and begin the process of adding scoops into my machine along with oat milk in my frother and have cinnamon at the ready. While the coffee is brewing and the aroma is permeating throughout the house, I set my meditation timer in the interim and meditate, using a three part diaphragmatic breath to tune into my center. Then the coffee awaits my consumption and I am just so happy and it instantly puts me in a good mood.
Be creative in your fun. Get into the right side of the brain hemisphere which is considered to be the artistic, visual aspect to stimulate dopamine and serotonin neurotransmitters that help the mind and body feel motivated and positively stimulated.
Make it small and simple. It is often said that less is more. There is great value in keeping the focus simple so that we don’t overwhelm what we are trying to accomplish and start there, then eventually build on that. This makes it more digestible. Bite size.
Lean in, and to others for support. Find a friend to join in on creating on the ritual act of a resolution as it helps with accountability, this is the act of co-regulation and the chance to reflect with one another, and it may make it more fun and creative.
Nowadays I no longer dread my birthday, and invite the closing of the year so that I may make room for new resolutions, new opportunities to invent something new and different. In the meantime, I will be musing on what my resolution will be, or my personal ask and promise to myself for 2024. What is yours?
So beautiful Cammy ❤️❤️❤️❤️happy birthday xoxoxo
Happiest of Birthday Wishes to you Camellia! My resolutions often focus on the same elements, calling in more harmony, spirit and success. This year: Less phone scrolling. More friend time. Daily yoga or dance. Dream big in my creative vision!