It’s the time of year when people begin to make those trite New Year’s resolutions that seem never to come to fruition.  “I’m going to exercise every day.”  “At midnight on December 31st, I quit smoking.”   “I’m going to lose weight.”  There are hundreds of them, I am sure, but the thing that always bugged me about empty resolutions was the fact that I never understood why I didn’t comply with my own wishes.  I figured it all out and, of course, the answer is complicated.

There is a big difference between goals and resolutions.  According to World Book Dictionary:

goal: a thing for which an effort is made; thing wanted

resolution: a thing decided on; thing determined; the power of holding firmly to a purpose

To make a resolution one needs to be really sure about the level of commitment to seeing it through.  To set goals one needs to come up with a list of things he wants and figure out a plan to get them.  These can change frequently and do when goals are reached. New ones have to be set.  Goals keep one going in a positive direction.  They are things for which an effort is made.  That means that if the effort is not quite enough to hit the intended mark, just go back to the drawing board and try again.  Nothing is lost in this game of goal setting.  Just keep trying.  On the other hand, resolutions are much more serious, and guilt is attached to not achieving the intended level of resolve.  Resolutions cannot be made in five minutes before the toast and the big peach drop.  Serious time and thought should go into the process.

If, for example, your resolution is to quit smoking, you must decide just why you want to quit.  If it is for the wrong reason, it should be a goal and not a resolution.  Otherwise you will set yourself up for failure right off the bat.  If you want to quit for very personal health reasons or because you are tired of the negative aspects of smoking, chances are good that a resolution to do so will work.  If you are quitting because your significant other want you to, make it a goal to quit by a certain time, but don’t resolve to do it by then because you might not make it.  If it is a goal, you can always change the targeted quit date as it comes around if you are not personally ready to give up the smokes.