I assume these things are mainstream crap said around just to try to feel accomplished whenever they do a minimal positive change...
Besides, I don't see the point of starting doing this in "new year", why not months ago when you knew you could have?
New year means nothing, it's just a label... If it was your birthday and you want to celebrated how long you've survived, then sure, you might try to do something to improve yourself on the occasion of being good at keeping yourself alive, but new year...? It's also just the excuse for people to do stupid things and later pretend they never happened.

10 minutes ago, Keiko said:

I assume these things are mainstream crap said around just to try to feel accomplished whenever they do a minimal positive change...
Besides, I don't see the point of starting doing this in "new year", why not months ago when you knew you could have?
New year means nothing, it's just a label... If it was your birthday and you want to celebrated how long you've survived, then sure, you might try to do something to improve yourself on the occasion of being good at keeping yourself alive, but new year...? It's also just the excuse for people to do stupid things and later pretend they never happened.

I agree! It has become a stupid trend people use to attract attention.

"Oh, look at me! I'm making a change! Wow, so inspiring!"

It really isn't inspiring. People change and improve all the time, and they don't get recognition for it. Why should they? It's a personal choice and the whole world doesn't need to know about it.

Anyway, the way you worded your comment was excellent. You bring up great points that I agree with.

I've never met anyone that actually says "new year, new me" I think that might just be some sort of media thing (around here anyway). But I know many people that make resolutions and stick with them for the entire time. So I think saying most people give up is also inaccurate. I personally don't make resolutions, but I can see the appeal of using New Years as a simple starting point and a clear timeframe

I hardly ever do the NY resolution thing.  Resolutions have always struck me as unrealistic.  Either they're too little or they're too much.  If they're too much they can backfire and mess with your head.  If they're too little then I don't really feel I accomplished anything significant.

My plan has always just been to continuously try to do things better than I did last time.  That's a goal that is always within reach and therefore fairly easy to make a habit out of.  I find that works better for me than doing the new year's resolution thing every January.

On 1/4/2019 at 5:21 AM, Wedgy said:

People use the new year more or less as a marker. Because it's easier to say "my progress since 2017" rather than "my progress since 6 September, 2017." I'm on board with the whole "Why wait? Why not now?" thinking, but I'm not going to be critical of people who like to have a goal and decide to start at a certain time.

I think that's a good explanation for why people wait for new year to make a change.

Because it's easier to look back and remember when you started. It's easier to say, Oh I've been exercising for 6 years now. I started in 2017. Rather than Oh, I've been exercising for maybe 6 years now. I started around 2017. Maybe mid 2017.

But I agree with what most people already said. There's no need to wait for new year to change/improve. You can start tomorrow. Or in the next 5 minutes.