2011 It's a New Year!

Time to break out the resolutions, a new year a new you, and all of those other cliche phrases you see thrown around this time of year. The whole concept of resolutions is a good one I think, but honestly I also see a few problems with them.

I love that making resolutions causes you to re-evaluate your life and look at ways that you can improve. I think that personal improvement is something that we should always strive for. No one is perfect and there are always things that we can do to make our lives, and the lives of those who are around us better.

I hate that peoples resolutions so often tend to pick things that are related to living up to the unrealistic expectations that society tends to place on us. Women and men both resolve to be more perfect in the eyes of others. They want to look like the perfect tall, thin, healthy, together no problems person that is always on TV. The resolutions that are prompted by feelings of inadequacy are the ones that worry me.

When people decide that their lives need a change, that change needs to be prompted by something from within, not from outside pressure. We need to make resolutions that are rooted in the desire to accomplish something, not resolutions that are rooted in guilt and peer pressure.

Now to me... I have been guilty of making resolutions for all of the wrong reasons for many years, so this year I am changing my thinking and making resolutions that will help to make me a better person from the inside out and not from the outside in. So here they go.

1) I resolve not to make any resolutions that are motivated by peer pressure and feelings of inadequacy.
2) I resolve to love me for me, this includes all of my faults as well as the areas that aren't. I will try to stop obsessing about things that I notice about myself and my appearance that bother me and instead remember that I am beautiful for who I am.
3) I resolve to be more supportive of and helpful to the people that I come into contact with, this includes family, friends, acquaintances, and strangers. I will try to make sure that the way I treat people always leaves them feeling better rather than worse.

I think that this should be it for now. Those are both pretty big and pretty difficult so I will stop there before I set myself up for failure.

So what were your resolutions? Did you make them because they are really something that you want to do? Or were you motivated by pressure from friends and society. I urge you to think about the motives behind your resolutions and make some that are honest and true reflections of things that You want to change about You to make yourself a better person from the inside out.