New Year. New You?
The approaching new year creates a universal hope that the trials and tribulations of this year don’t plague us in the next. The hope that things will be different in the new year, and you’ll finally be happy or successful or fulfilled or whatever it is you’ve been needing. So we make all these promises to ourselves: this year you’re going to lose that weight! Or this year, you’re going to stand up against your parents! Or maybe this year is the year you finally start traveling the world!
It’s totally normal and healthy to make goals for yourself, especially when those goals are aligned with what you want and need. But, sometimes we can take these goals a bit too far. Sometimes it’s plunging into crash starvation diets, or maybe sending that text to your parents before re-reading your first draft — it’s this layer of urgency that makes our new years resolutions so unhealthy.
Why the rush?
If your New Year’s resolution comes with this kind of urgency, it’s important to ask yourself why. What’s so urgent about this goal that I have to do it all right now?
It could be that it’s a need you’ve had for a long time that for whatever reason hasn’t been met. So, understandably, the rush to meet that need now has always existed, but maybe it’s more that something got in the way. For example, maybe you would have booked that vacation to Europe if work hadn’t gotten so busy last spring. And, so while it’s still important to book that vacation soon, the better resolution might be to focus on and prioritize your needs over work. How could your new year be improved by shifting the goal to your wellness, and away from accomplishment?
Or, it could be that the urgency you feel to accomplish your New Year’s resolution right now is because you’ve attached more value to the accomplishment of the goal than to the journey of reaching it. Maybe some part of you believes you don’t deserve an easier, happier, or more successful new year until you accomplish the task you set out to do. If you’re self worth is tied to your ability to complete a New Year’s resolution, then you’re starting the new year with a negative balance in the self-love bank.
If not resolutions, then what?
While resolutions are typically goal-like, they don’t have to be. You get to make the new year mean whatever you want it to mean! So, if you’d like to get away from toxic goal setting, try out some of these ideas instead.
Adopt a mantra. If the turn of the new year symbolizes the refreshening of your life, you might consider adopting a mantra in the new year. A mantra is a short phrase or sentence that sets our perspective — think words to live by! For example, “I’m open to whatever may come my way” is a mantra that can set you up to be flexible, adaptable, and courageous, no matter what the circumstances. The goal of the mantra is to open up possibilities, rather than to tie you to one specific goal or path. And the beauty of a mantra is it’s with you all year, whereas a resolution is released as soon as it’s accomplished (or determined to be unachievable). So, no matter what you’re required to do throughout the year, you can refer to that mantra as your way to approach the necessary tasks.
Focus on the need. If you’re realizing your urgency comes from a pattern of deferring your needs, maybe this new year can be the year you connect back to yourself and prioritize your needs. This year can be the year you listen to your body, or the year you build a deeper connection with yourself. If you’ve been avoiding your needs, you can ask why you might choose to do that? Are those reasons justifiable or aligned with your values? And if you’re just struggling to know what you need, this new year can be an opportunity to build skills to identify when you’re body is expressing a need. Develop a practice of noticing your body, the sensations inside and out. Maybe you cry when you’re mad; or maybe you feel this fluttery feeling in your chest whenever you talk to your boss. What could your body be trying to tell you?
Start with love. If starting the new year with a low balance in the self-love bank is a pattern for you, maybe this is the year you love yourself first. Maybe this is the year you reject any conditions for self love and start to let it flow freely. Whether that’s dancing in the shower, or indulging in your favorite treats, the new year can be all about giving yourself the love it deserves, without having to “earn” it by accomplishing some tasks that felt urgent at the end of the past year. And, if you’ve been requiring an exchange for your self love in the past, this new year can be a good time to reflect on why. Throughout your life, what have you learned about love? What have you learned about self love or selfishness? What have you come to believe about your own self worth and how do those thing keep you from starting with love?
Whether you use one of these approaches to the new year or you stick with your typical resolutions, just remember to be gentle with yourself. Not all resolutions are good ones and there may come a time when you choose to let it go. Whether that resolution becomes unachievable or unimportant, approach that change with kindness. You can’t know who or how you’ll be in the new year, but if you stay committed to your health and wellness, it doesn’t really matter how you do it.
