Now, I love New Years. It's a beginning- another year of crazy, stressful, beautiful life. A new year coming in is definitely something to celebrate and I love how everyone comes together with the people they love to ring it in. However, I do not believe it is a time for reinvention or an excuse to act like scum for the remainder of the old year. Why wait to change something about yourself, and why make false promises that you know you aren't going to keep? You're just going to let yourself down and add unnecessary stress to your life.
I know so many people who give themselves New Years resolutions and then beat themselves up about not keeping them. Many resolutions are unrealistic and they cause you to immediately start your year off with stress, lies, and ultimately failure. There is no reason to set yourself up to be disappointed. And while there are some people who do keep their resolutions, they very rarely keep it to themselves. Most people publicly announce their resolutions and then end up publicly documenting their progress. People who actually want to better themselves are not doing it for other people. They are doing it for them and therefore feel no real need to brag constantly about how many times a week they go to the gym or how many cigarettes they did not smoke today.
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And since you have that 'new year, new you' mentality (which by the way is literally one of the worst and most popular mantras I have ever heard), you use it as an excuse to spend the remainder of the year treating yourself and probably other people like trash. And that's not okay. Smoking as many cigarettes as you can every day because you know you'll finally quit in the new year but ultimately end up becoming even more addicted than you already were, making it harder to quit. Not eating healthy because you're going to be eating nothing but lettuce in the new year but by the time the clock strikes midnight, your health has already taken a turn for the worse. Cursing everyone out because you're putting a swear jar in your apartment but you've already formed the habit so two weeks in you're sitting on your couch pissed off and fucking broke. Do you see the pattern?
So if you get any takeaway from this article let it be this- stop putting so much pressure on yourself. If you want to be a better person, you don't have to wait for the number to change on your calendar. Just do it. Ring in the new year with nothing but fun and laughs and good people and the knowledge that you are already your best self. Besides, we're only human. And from one human to another, you're probably already pretty great.
