Set values, not resolutions

Since the COVID-19 pandemic began, I haven’t made a poster of resolutions. With the world spinning around me, it seemed futile to set lofty and aspirational goals — all I wanted was some sense of normalcy. From my vantage point, they only played into the restrictive stereotype that we constantly needed to improve. And as the pandemic transformed the world I knew, that stereotype became less attractive by the day. 

I’m not alone in my disillusionment toward New Year’s resolutions. 

CBS News reported, at the end of last year, that just 29% of Americans planned to make New Year’s resolutions for 2022. The year before, 43% of Americans made resolutions. According to a Spinnaker column, New Year’s resolutions are flawed because they “neglect making room for curveballs.” And if there is an apt metaphor to describe the past three years, it would be a nasty, wicked curveball. 2020 served up a deadly global pandemic that continues to take lives every day and prompted a referendum on systemic racism in America; 2021 began with an insurrection incited by a sitting president; 2022 marked the start of the Ukraine war, the end of Roe v. Wade and another record year of mass shootings. 

For children and students, the last three years have been just as hard. The pandemic completely disrupted every structure and system in place — school, sports, networks of family and friends. For those who witnessed the days of Zoom school, hybrid learning, and distanced sports practices, it was pretty clear that most of us were managing to stay afloat, but not, by any measure, thriving — or in a place where it felt appropriate to make New Year’s resolutions.

But this year, I’ve got my poster paper and my glitter pens ready, “2023” engraved on the center of the page in my finest bubble letters. Don’t get me wrong: New Year’s resolutions still seem a little ridiculous and trite; however, I think the past three years offer a unique opportunity for a new approach to making yearlong goals.

Arthur C. Brooks wrote in The Atlantic that New Year’s resolutions are merely socially-acceptable attempts to increase how happy we are. Put in another way, New Year’s resolutions are our attempt to find a simple fix to everything we dislike about ourselves. But rigid, harsh and downright unrealistic demands don’t work, and rarely achieve the happiness we set out for. 

Here’s my suggestion: Rather than find inspiration in scrolling through social media, lamenting our failures from the past year, or comparing ourselves to friends and colleagues, I think that we should begin at the end. When the year is over, how do we want to feel? What values do we want to embody? What words of gratitude do we want to say over the next Thanksgiving dinner?

Rather than begin with superficial resolutions in an attempt to manufacture tangible improvements in our lives, we should think of a few, simple words to describe who we want to be at the end of the year. Once we establish a tangible end point, we can use all the traditional methods of goal setting to reach that end: make structural changes in your routines, establish measurable goals, reward yourself for small successes, and accept setbacks as par for the course. 

The only requirement for these goals is that they connect directly to the values you scribbled down at the start of the year. Because if there is anything that I have learned from the last three years, it is that we can’t get attached to expectations of what life should or will look like. Instead, we should get attached to our values and to the things we hold dearest — everything else will follow. 

Elise Spenner is a junior at Burlingame High School. Student News appears in the weekend edition. You can email Student News at news@smdailyjournal.com.