Riddle me this, if you want to change something in your life, what benefit comes with waiting until Jan. 1 to initiate the change?
The answer: none. In reality, New Year's resolutions have potential to do more harm than good.
Let's assume, like everyone else in the world, your new Year's resolution is to lose weight by eating healthier and exercising more. When your new lifestyle doesn't deliver immediate results, and you don't look like Nicole Richie by February, statistics have shown there's a good chance you'll resort to even worse habits than when you started. Next thing you know, your New Year's resolution is out the window, and you've gained 10 pounds. Fail.
To set the record straight, I'm not saying you shouldn't set goals to be more healthy or stop a bad habit.
But seriously, if you realize in October that you need to change something in your life, putting it off until January is just plain stupid and lazy.
And if you wait until January, statistics have shown there's more than a 90 percent chance you'll fail. According to researcher John Norcross and his colleagues, who published their findings in the Journal of Clinical Psychology in 2002, around 40-45 percent of adults make resolutions every year. Six months in, less than half will be successful. Only 8 percent will last through the year.
If you're part of the half that does make a resolution, congratulations, you are the ultimate procrastinator. You better have a really good, detailed plan and timeline to reach your goals since you've been sitting on them for so long. Unless, of course, you
irrationally made a last minute resolution, just for the hell of making it, in which I still think you're going to fail.
On a more positive note, kudos to anyone who has successfully completed their resolution. I apologize if this editorial offends you.
For the rest of you, do yourself a favor. Wait until February and start over. Then you'll know you want to change for the sake of improving your life, rather than changing for the sake of change.
Best of luck in 2010. It'll still suck as much as last year. t&c;
Jeana Harrington is a senior public relations and journalism major and is the business manager for the t&c.;
