New Resolutions and Old Responsibilities

The countless lists of new resolutions and the banter about how people are sure that they will stick to them are the talk of the day as we start fresh with a brand new year. A new year is a perfect time to take a look at our lives and seek ways that we can improve on the imperfections that we begrudgingly must admit. The more popular promises to one's self are to lose weight, to start exercising, be kind to other people, to save money and so on and so on. You can look at a resolution from most anywhere in the world and some of these will surely be at the top of the heap.

While looking at ways to improve ourselves is always a healthy proposition, it usually ends up being more words than actions. Most of the grand resolutions will fall by the way side by the end of January. Some will not make it through the New Year's Day as the snacks at the football Bowl parties are just too tempting to walk away from. To those of you who can fulfill your commitments by running, dieting,penny pinching, and telling your fellow man how wonderful they are, let me be the first to use a tired old expression for a brand new year...."Good Luck with That"!

However, if there are some of you out there who are like me and just do not have the energy to take on new promises, that we will not keep, let me offer a suggestion to you. How about taking care of issues that did not end simply because we ran out of days on the 2005 calendar? How about making a resolution to try your hardest to be the kind of parent that your child deserves? Maybe this is the year where you will actually put your kid first and not continue to say "hold on a minute, I'll be right there", only to never make it at all. The minutes that a child can hold on are ticking away like crazy. Do not wait until the clock has stopped ticking before you find the time that you continue to promise.

How about making a resolution that the person, whom you married, is still someone that you would marry all over again. Granted, at first glance they may not look like the same person you married. There is surely a little less hair, a little more weight in some not so favorable locations, a little bit lazier and a lot more grumpier than the person you married. But, beneath the bumps and lumps, resolve that the person that you married is still the person whom you want to spend the rest of your life with. Who knows, this new found adoration may make your mate strive to look like the one you married.

Make a resolution to make your life a little less stressful. Jobs are a necessary part of all of our lives and we should all do our jobs the best that we can. But, they are still just jobs. Never let the job come before those things in your life that will still be there when the job is gone. Make a resolution that traffic is a part of our lives now. There is not a horn loud enough, a finger gesture powerful enough, or a dirty word that is strong enough to do anything about it. Sit back and relax. You may even find some entertainment in watching the show from those who still think that their ridiculous actions will make a difference. I promise that you will get to your destination as soon as they do; gesture free!

Make a resolution to just take a look at yourself. What are the little things that you can do to make your life, and the lives of those around you, a little bit better? Sometimes it is the small things that make the biggest impact. Resolve that resolutions, goals and wanted accomplishments center around the future. But, never underestimate the value of the present. Never allow yourself to be so focused on the future that you cannot see those things that are right in front of you. Incredible dreams often pale in comparison to those things that we already have. When we wish to hard for things that we do not have, it is easy to neglect those things that we do have.

I realize that there are some of you who will feel obligated to make grand plans on the start of the New Year. To those people, only you can determine if any of the goals will be accomplished. To the rest of us, maybe this New Year will be a time where we decide not to take on new resolutions but to simply try and accomplish some of those resolutions from many of the past years. It is perhaps, the completion of those old goals, which will best identify how the New Year will be remembered by each of us.

Happy New Year to each of you and best wishes for a wonderful 2006!