Quirkbag Collection #25 – 02.01.26
It’s 2026! Happy New Year to all those reading this, though I suspect most of you reading would be from the future (2030 anyone?). The new year is yet another famed occasion for following tradition. Countdowns, parties, booze, New Year’s Resolutions. It’s a Santa wish list for the New Year. If you have been around long enough though, failing to follow through with New Year’s Resolutions is probably nothing new to you. Surely, you’d think after 2000 odd years that humanity (with lightbulbs and iPhones) can figure out why New Year’s resolutions don’t work.
Let’s hear it from a cranky 20 year old – me.
New Year’s Resolutions: A New Hope
New Year’s resolutions imply a new hope for people (anyone call for a Jedi?). A new year is a fresh start and a clean slate. Who doesn’t love to start new things? It’s fun and easy. That’s why it’s so common for endless lists of goals to be made before January. Everything feels possible when it’s fictional.
But when it comes to finishing those things, we are forced to confront our shortcomings. There comes the boring, tedious, dreary “work”. We no longer want that commitment.
“I can’t take another meal of this diet that tastes like cardboard” probably sounds familiar.
Or “this gym is simply too far away and too crowded” – the beginning of the end of yet another burst of fitness enthusiasm.
It’s no longer fun and thrilling. And so, one moment of weakness leads to another, and before March is here, the resolutions aren’t all that resolute anymore. The new hope that popped out around the new year quickly fades when the year is…not so new anymore. Now, your goals become work and your determination to achieve those goals is tested.
So what happened to those once invincible resolutions 2 months ago?
New Year’s Resolutions: Reality Strikes Back
The reality is that those resolutions probably weren’t that invincible to begin with. Here’s the uncomfortable truth: the dreary, tedious work was always inherent in your goal, it was just hidden by the short-lived excitement and hope around the new year.
Think about this New Year resolution: “I want to go on a diet this year and lose 5kg.”
Sounds good. It’s pretty common. But how?
New Year resolutions fail because it is easy to fall off the bandwagon. Rather than committing to the full year of dieting consistently with meal plans, for example, the thought process started with having a diet (the food magically falls onto the plate and those sneaky late night cravings mysteriously disappear) and ended with losing 5kg months later.
In other words, reality does not play ball with your imagination. Spoiler alert: it NEVER will. There will be times when fear, stress and temptation seize control of your “resolution” and it is in those moments when you get to decide how invincible and resolute those New Year resolutions are.
A new year resolution based on imagination without a plan rooted in reality is going to be like the Titanic – wrecked. It may feel like that plan could not be wrecked when enthusiasm is brimming around the New Year. Disclaimer: pinning hopes onto a New Year’s resolution without a solid plan is a surefire way to disappointment (unless you’re ridiculously lucky or disciplined).
Finding Resolutions to New Year’s Resolutions
Just because the number of the year increases by one and the Earth begins a new orbit around the Sun does not, in any way (and it pains me to say), give New Year’s resolutions any more achievable than it would at any other time of the year.
The Earth does not grant magical powers annually. But you can grant yourself all the magic you need. All there is to a feasible and likely-to-succeed resolution is a proper plan. So, for those of you that are sick of failing to stick with New Year’s resolutions: prepare to take some notes from the experts.
The easiest way to achieve a New Year’s resolution is to break it down into small actions, preferably habits that can compound. These small actions repeated over time consistently form a system which then acts as an expressway to your goal.
Before you fall into the trap of thinking that there is a one size-fits-all option, there is not. If you have been living under some rock, the most common tool advertised is setting a SMART Goal. That means you set a goal that is Specific, Measurable, Achievable, Realistic and Timely. For beginners (or even more experienced ones), this framework keeps a clear outcome in mind. But more importantly, it keeps you on track and prevents you from making the deadliest mistake – being distracted.
A proper plan consists of steps and actions that can be taken consistently, over a period of time, that when executed will at the end bring you the desired outcome. It will be tough
The trick to this is designing methods to prevent yourself from “falling off the bandwagon”. If you are the kind who likes precision and failsafe measures, contingencies and alternatives are useful.
New Year’s Resolution: Cutting Junk Food
If you intend to cut “junk food”, the basic routine goes – define junk food (list the names of the fast-food/junk food if you wish), steer clear of them, plan out your meals. But, you may then consider going the extra mile of writing and sourcing specific alternatives if all else fails. This could be meal-prep or eating healthy snacks.
Perhaps the greatest risk to the resolution is being hungry and not knowing what to go for; and in the uncertainty, junk food feels like a comfortable last resort. And before you know it, you sit in a pool of guilt knowing you failed to stick with the plan. Worst of all, you give up the whole thing after one slip-up. When the next year comes around, history repeats itself.
Not all is lost after one slip-up for a New Year’s resolution, especially if your goal is to “cut” rather than “eliminate”. If you take the effort to plan out when you allow for a “cheat meal” and when it’s time for healthy alternatives, you give yourself a real fighting chance at following the programme.
It’ll look different for everyone, but “everyone” is not your concern. Your concern is you. It might start with eating junk food 3 times a month, or 2 times a week. So long as the goal is a lower frequency than the current one, you are making progress.
You then have to accept that it will take time to achieve that resolution. If you should find yourself impatient to achieve that goal, think of it as motivation to keep going.
New Year’s Resolution: My Tips
Here are some of my tips, from my experience of building more consistent practices like writing this blog.
- Your resolution is yours – own it. It is a promise you made to yourself and you ought to keep it as you would with anyone else. It should not be seen as “an interruption”.
- Ignore judgement – focus only on what you want to achieve and not what others think of you while you are trying to achieve it; they usually can’t help you with resolutions.
- Do it for an intrinsic reason – you have to want to do it for yourself and the benefits it brings for you. It is far easier to stick with it when you believe in why you are doing it.
To sum this up with brevity and levity, my biggest tip is this: New Year’s resolutions are just a hoax because if you really want to achieve something new, it does not need to wait till January. And if do fail to meet some arbitrary marker of success this year, take comfort in knowing you are not alone.
Guess what? There’s another January next year!
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