By Vickie Rhodehamel
Arcanum News
Happy New Year! Can you believe it is 2023? Did you know that 45 percent of all Americans make New Year’s resolutions? Statistics report that after six months only 40 percent have made progress on their resolutions. Contrary to widespread public opinion, a considerable proportion of New Year resolvers do succeed. What’s more, scientific research indicates that you are 10 times more likely to change by making a New Year’s resolution compared to non-resolvers with the identical goals and comparable motivation to change.
So, you think this year is the year you’ll keep your resolutions? Here are some resolutions from the past to help you write your New Year’s resolution:
Susan Sontag: “Kindness, kindness, kindness. I want to make a New Year’s prayer, not a resolution. I’m praying for courage.”
Cary Grant: “I propose to never make a resolution which won’t be as important on the eighth of April or the 10th of July as it is on the first of January.”
Leonard Bernstein: “From New Year’s on the outlook brightens; good humor lost in a mood of failure returns. I resolve to stop complaining.”
Melody Beattie: “The New Year stands before us, like a chapter in a book, waiting to be written. We can help write that story by setting goals.”
Jay Leno: “Now there are more overweight people in America than average-weight people. So overweight people are now average… which means, you have met your New Year’s resolution.”
Alfred Lord Tennyson: “Hope smiles from the threshold of the year to come, whispering, ‘It will be happier.’”
Helen Keller: “Your success and happiness lies in you. Resolve to keep happy, and your joy and you shall form an invincible host against difficulties.”
Hal Borland: “Year’s end is neither an end nor a beginning but a going on, with all the wisdom that experience can instill in us.”
Oprah Winfrey: “Cheers to a new year and another chance for us to get it right.”
Benjamin Franklin: “Be at war with your vices; at peace with your neighbors, and let every new year find you a better man.”
Charles Kettering: “Every time you tear a leaf off a calendar, you present a new place for new ideas and progress.”
F. Scott Fitzgerald: “First you take a drink, then the drink takes a drink, then the drink takes you.”
If one of your resolutions is to start exercising, remember that Arcanum-Butler Local Schools is open to the public for adult walking Monday-Thursday evenings from 6 to 8 p.m. through March 31. Walking is restricted to the first-floor tiled hallways.
To make 2023 your year and you are not making resolutions, why not begin with setting goals that are attainable and hold yourself 100 percent accountable. Have trouble keeping goals? Try this technique – set s.m.a.r.t. goals: Specific. Measurable. Attainable. Realistic. Timely.
Don’t overwhelm yourself with too many goals; start with three and no more. Focus these around your health, wealth, and relationships. To live a happy life, that’s all you really need! By setting simple, straightforward, actionable goals, you’ll stay focused and make it to the finish line in no time. Happy New Year, may 2023 be everything you wish!
