The New Year is now upon us, and events are moving faster and propelling the world to the future. It is not my purpose to bore you with my opinion of those events, for we all know what they are and you know what they say about opinions. I have long thought that the chances were high that 2025 would be a significant year for several reasons, and I hope on a personal note that it is, for I have some things I have been trying to do these past years that I hope will come to fruition.

With the New Year, many will take the opportunity of a new start to set resolutions for the coming year. Whether their goals include personal improvement, professional advancement, or any other such wishes, now seems to be the time to do it. For myself, however, I have never seen the point of making resolutions. Let me explain.

I suppose, most of all, I consider the exercise pointless. To anyone reading this that is in the habit of setting resolutions, when was the last time you made a resolution and stuck with it longer than the end of January? Perhaps it fell by the wayside even sooner? To be clear I have not done any research on the subject I consider pointless, but I have often read articles suggesting that the vast majority of resolutions do not keep them long, and that is only considering those who agree to tell the truth when asked in a survey or the like. What use is there to set a goal to lose 10 pounds only to ignore it a few weeks later? Now, I am not advocating or suggesting goals are useless, so bear with me.

Why wait until the New Year to set new goals? As I see it, the only reason is the sense of renewal that one feels at the New Year. To own the truth, I do not really even celebrate the New Year, for to me it really is not much more than just another day. As a Christian, I am more interested in celebrating Christmas and Easter, my wife and children’s successes, and other significant family events. The New Year is an arbitrary time to set new goals in my opinion, and I have often seen and heard other speak of the goals they will set when the calendar turns, only to look at it and see the date is early March! When then would you wait nine months if you identified something about yourself that needs improvement?

Instead of setting resolutions, I prefer to take action when I identify something amiss rather than wait. It seems to me that we can always improve ourselves, and what time is better than the present? I do not wish to sound preachy, but we should be improving at all times even if that progress is only incremental. That is the reason I have always disdained resolutions, because I hope when the New Year arrives that I am already working on something. Perhaps it may take me a while to make any changes, but I don’t wait to make them when they become clear to me.

That said, I wish everyone reading this a successful and prosperous New Year! Stay tuned next week, for I intend to post about a rough roadmap for the following year.