By Kate Stockrahm
I’ve always had mixed feelings about new year’s resolutions.
On the one hand, I feel foolish pretending the change of a calendar date will motivate me to do all the things I should (but don’t) do anyway, like drink more water or eat less red meat.
But on the other hand, what’s so awful about setting goals?
A quick Google search of “new year’s resolutions” brings up many of the things we promise ourselves we’ll start doing every January: “save more money,” “eat healthier,” and “spend more time with family,” all fall into the top results.
These are worthwhile pursuits of course, and I don’t fault anyone working toward them this year. In fact, I sincerely hope that they succeed.
But when my family and friends asked me about my 2025 resolutions (as required during every lull in conversation over a holiday buffet table), I had nothing for them this time.
“I don’t really have any,” I’d say, grabbing a handful of potato chips and a third Christmas tree-shaped sugar cookie.
This would prompt a good-natured, “Oh, really? Not a resolution person, huh?”
Is that so bad? I’d think, now inexplicably going for a fourth cookie even though I’d stopped being hungry two hours before.
Instead of sharing my thoughts, however, I found myself trying to be a good sport and offering up something like: “Oh. Well I don’t want to call it a resolution, but I’m going to try to keep a pescatarian diet next year.”
Will I though? Meh, maybe. I do love sushi.
When examining my reluctance to set any resolutions post-holiday parties, I realized that what I don’t like about making them is the fact I’ve rarely kept them in the past. And worse still, I know that’s my own fault.
Though each year goes up in number, the hours in their days stay the same. I know I can’t exercise more if I don’t also do less of something else – and figuring out what I want to do less of each December doesn’t bring me any joy. And shouldn’t joy be part of our new year’s aspirations?
So, rather than spurn creating resolutions altogether (or continue to make them up at work events and family functions this month), I’ve decided that I’m going to set joyous, reasonable ones for 2025.
Here’s my working list:
- Eat a full ball of burrata all to myself
- Compliment a stranger on their outfit
- Give up on a book I don’t like rather than finishing it because I feel like I have to (and the characters will somehow know if I don’t)
- Wear more patterns
- Go on a walk with no destination in mind
- Learn the name of each dog I meet
- Visit a museum I’ve never been to before
- Fail at any one of the above and be fine with it
While none of these resolutions may wind up in the top 10 of a Google search anytime soon, they all feel achievable in the time I already have – not time I feel obligated to make – in 2025. And maybe that will be the trick to actually keeping to them this time through.
All this to say, here’s to a new year full of burrata, conversations with strangers, good books, and learning new things.
I wish you and yours a happy, healthy, and joyous 2025, no matter your resolutions (or lack thereof)!
This article also appears in East Village Magazine’s January 2025 issue.
