Back in High School I took debate class, in the class we often did daily resolutions. It was the focal point of the debate or talk. Mrs. Khan would write, in BIG letters, on the chalk board "Resolved:" and would ask the class what the resolution of the day should be. As the class went on and we were assigned topics the person or team that was on the affirmation side of the resolution had the privileged of writing on the board. I still remember writing "Resolved: Why you shouldn't use steroids" and using the opening statement "If you want your balls to shrink, use steroids!". Have I mentioned that I'm a misfit and I love exploring shock value?
Over the years I've attempted, and failed most if not all of my, various New Year's Resolutions. Recently I even thought of making a resolution to writing and posting more on this Blog, however I know that it won't work so I'm not doing it. Will I make more efforts to write, to post here? Yes. Will a resolution be the thing that helps me? No, I know myself, my current commitments, cynicism and drive and honestly, while I'd like to write all day, I won't, at least not with what I have in my life today.
In the past my resolutions have ranged from the normal stuff like lose weight, eat healthier, save the world, learn to juggle, wake up earlier, or be nicer to people...to more ambitious/strange resolutions that I'm not going to bore you the details of here. Each time, I find that while I'm eager to get started on these new found pacts of imminent failure, I typically run out of gusto within a week or two. Sometimes I'm able to hold onto something for a couple months but typically by the start of March I've forgotten that I even made a resolution and I'd be hard pressed to remember what is was for.
So why do so many people fail, why do I say that they are a waste of time? That is a really good question! I'm so glad that someone smart like you is reading this. I do know that for some people resolutions are great & they have experienced amazing life transformation as a result of a drunken (or more sober) resolution they made relative to New Year's Eve/Day. Still, for the rest of us, or at least the people I come into contact with the most, resolutions don't work.
I believe that the problem isn't that we fail in starting new stuff as much as it is that we fail in ending the things that need ending.
One of the great things about December 31st is that no matter how much you don't want it to, at midnight the day, month and year are over. It is a great way to start over and really, no matter how much you want to try, you can't get back into December once it is January. December ended and January started and that is it. Too many times in areas outside our calendar the things that need to end don't.
I know someone (several someones actually) who didn't end a relationship in their heart when the relationship ended and many years after the fact found themselves married to someone else, in what seemed to be a good relationship. Later down their journey, too often in the story, the ex pops back up on the radar and these people I know found themselves in a world of confusion and pain. Often they made poor decisions, carving out valleys of pain in many peoples hearts and too many times the people I know who didn't end the relationship in their heart when they should have years before were left standing alone once the dust had settled because they pursued ex lovers, forsaking their at that time current partners. The end should really mean the end. Driving past the dead end signs because you don't believe them will not keep you safe when the road ends. So too will relationships that should have ended but didn't don't have much hope in their future.
When I first met my wife, I was dating someone else, my wife had a boyfriend too. Our story is a whirlwind of a tale in which we went on our first date, not even acknowledging it was a date, less than a month before we were engaged. It is a fun, crazy story we love telling and retelling over the years. We were young, in love and in many ways stupid but we knew that we were the right ones for each other. We also knew that we had baggage and that we had to make sure that we addressed it. If we didn't, no matter how much we wanted the relationship to work, we would have been doomed. We needed to make sure that our past relationships were ended. Almost Seventeen years later, I can tell you had we not ended the things that needed ending properly, we wouldn't have the joy and security in our lives as we do today. It isn't the only thing that has contributed to a good matrimony for us, but it was something that is part of the foundation.
Typically when we need to end something, it is one of two basic reasons. First the purpose or time of the thing has been completed, for example (and I'm over simplifying here) a company gets a contract to build a road, once they finish building the road, they don't need to continue to build the road. Another example is a college student doesn't need to stay in college once they've taken their course work, unless they are going on to advanced studies or they are wanting to do the whole 'lifetime student thing'...either way once the purpose of the 'thing' has come to completion, there is no longer any reason to continue to continue acting on, pursuing, partaking in or whatever else you would do with that 'thing'. The other side to this, the more difficult and where I've encountered difficulty and seen others struggle as well is ending things because it is time, often before we would like them to end, often when it is out of our control and often when we really don't want it to end.
Kelly, my wife, and I served as leaders for the college aged ministry at a church we were once at. We had hopes and dreams for the group. One day in our journey it became very clear that our dreams and visions weren't going to happen and that we had to step down, let go and move on. We had to end it. We didn't want to end it but we knew we had to.
It wasn't an easy decision, making the decision and executing on it caused pain for us and others. We spent months talking with wise people we trust, praying, examining ourselves trying to figure out if there was another way, something other than ending our part with the ministry. In the end there was only one option, it needed to end. Does that mean that we had to end it badly, with a bunch of drama and venom? No. It simply meant that 'thing' in this case, our involvement and leadership related to that ministry and involvement in that faith community needed to end. So we ended it. There is a way to end things well and a way to end things very badly, in this case we were able to end well. In a way that minimized pain, strife and bitterness. I believe that had we continued to try to make it work rather than ending it, we would have had terrible results. As difficult as it was, ending it was the proper and right thing to do.
Kelly and I have found ourselves in other situations, big or small where we need to end stuff. When it is the second reason, that it just has to, is never easy but it is necessarily. Too many times though I've seen bright and intelligent people make the decision to either not end 'it' or ignore 'it' only to have 'it' turn into 'that' thing in their life that seems to takeover and cause damage in so many other areas.
I could go on but I won't, at least much more.
Again, I say resolutions don't really work, they are a waste of time. I don't think they are the problem. I believe that the problem isn't that we fail in starting new stuff as much as it is that we fail in ending the things that need ending. In turn, when we properly end the things we need to end, we can then start the new things that we want/need to start. When we start doing that better, we may find more success in the new resolutions.
Cheers-
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