My New Year Resolution

End of the year. Motivational messages floating all around. In your face. Can’t ignore. Year 2018.... happiness, good health, prosperity, abundance, blah blah blah! Wait a minute. Didn’t we say all these too-good-to-be-true cliches about our beloved friend 2017, too? And 2016, before that? And beyond? 

Did you see how quickly we move on? But that is the spirit. We thrive on change, even though it is inconvenient at times. Clearly, change is the only constant in the world.

And then comes the baggage. The old promises were hardly fulfilled and now we are under the societal pressure to make new ones. Promises to our own self. Towards a better self. It amuses me, however, as to how we suddenly become answerable to the whole world.  People become outright nosy by asking, ‘So, what’s your new year’s resolution?’ These are the same people who try to belittle us just because they know that we won’t be able to commit to our resolutions for long. Huh! 

If you ask me, I think a New Year resolution is nothing more than a mere to-do list for the first week of January. The Earth completes one full revolution around the Sun in a year. I know it is a shocker for the people who think that they are the centre of the universe. But, clearly they aren’t. It is the Sun for us. May be, the Earth should make resolutions as a part of the celebrations. 

I could dish out a few suggestions. 

Earth’s New Year’s resolutions:

1. I will spin off jerks off my face.
2. I will give the Earthlings a chance to undo the harm that they have done to the environment.
3. Just like tree-huggers and dog lovers, I would appreciate a Humanity Club.
4. I would confiscate all the smart phones and tabs and go back to the family landline era.
5. All homework and exams are hereby banned on the Earth.
6. I insist on two weekends every week, for all Earthlings, etc.

Nonetheless, we all think that we have improved every year. This is a better version of us. Like a ‘Me 2.0’, may be. And we commit the same crime of jotting down our innermost desires, on a special piece of paper to be stuck on the fridge or dressing table or work-station. Just so you know, there is a very standard New Year’s resolution list which is quite universal, so to speak. Here it goes:

This New Year, I will:

1. lose weight,
2. get up early,
3. start morning/evening walks,
4. make healthier dietary choices,
5. join a gym,
6. enroll in a yoga/Zumba/aerobics class,
7. read at least one book every month,
8. travel twice a year, at least,
9. sleep on time,
10. give up smoking/drinking, etc.

And, lo and behold, we see a surge in the memberships of all sorts of fitness classes and gyms and libraries. You see the crowd for a fortnight, at the most; and then returns the drought. The gym is too tiring. The library is too far. I need to socialise over drinks and smoke. I have my office call at night. The soccer match is in the early morning hours. The reasons seem more valid than the resolutions. 

I remember investing in branded wrist watches for my children with alarm, so that they return home on time from their play. That was supposed to be their new year’s resolution. They now use it to determine when they are reasonably in a time frame of their own, so as to escape my wrath. They haven’t got the message, at all.

Speaking of messages, I would actually wish the following for all my near and dear ones:

1. May your body be slim and pay check fat.
2. May your helper be on time, daily.
3. May your children, if any, listen to you in one go.
4. May your spouse hand the control of the TV remote to you.
5. May you be showered with a bling lifestyle.
6. May you globe-trot to your heart’s content.
7. May you shop till you drop.

My resolution at the end of this year is the same as that of last year. I am going to cancel the subscription to other people’s nonsensical drama and stick to my own! Wink wink.