We make them at the start of every year, using the illusion of a blank slate and the open and endless possibilities that the New Year brings as an opportunity to create whole new lives for ourselves; a life where we will finally start eating our vegetables and running everyday. We call them New Year’s resolutions.

This phenomenon sweeps the nation at the start of each year, and these strategically named goals offer false hope and short-lived motivation to those who wish to turn their lives around.

A firm decision to do or not to do something defines a resolution. New Year’s resolutions exist as, essentially, ordinary resolutions or goals on steroids. A countless amount of people make bold, boisterous, and sometimes unattainable goals for themselves, using the long year ahead of them as a template for further success.

New Year’s resolutions tend to lean on the overly ambitious side. People often latch onto the goal of eating healthy and will try to change their eating habits entirely too quickly.

“My whole family is doing [a] weight loss diet resolution,” Magnet senior Kinsey Dupree said.

Taking into consideration every tasty morsel devoured in sight during the holidays, and abruptly switching to a no carb diet takes a toll on one’s will to maintain the habit. At seemingly the snap of a finger to try and attain a goal, motivation dwindles altogether too rapidly.

Most people who create resolutions allow the new year to act as their motivating factor. This idea acts as a completely counterproductive measure, seeing as how the newness of the year only lasts for so long. Goals must exist in accordance to how much one wishes to attain them. Goals center around the individuals themselves— not around the New Year.

Less than half of the people who choose to create New Year’s resolutions maintain their goals past the six month mark.

“I feel like January is the time where its like ‘Go! Gotta do it! It’s new! Fresh start!’ but then by March I don’t care,” Magnet senior Kaylin Altman said.

The allure of New Year’s resolutions relies too much on the “New Year” aspect. One may start eating unhealthily in March, with the consolation that beginning January, they will start heaping greens onto their plates. One may stop working out at the gym in February, telling themselves that they can always try again next year. This line of thinking creates a false sense of security. As long as a person relies on the “blank slate” of the new year, none of their resolutions will stick.

Typically, people create long lists of resolutions yearning for a sense of accomplishment. This list simply acts as another hindrance to their success because it becomes too overwhelming to attain all of the resolutions.

“I could say ‘I want to have a better semester in school,’ and that could mean a lot of things. We could be talking about my grades or my relationship with my friends and teachers, ” junior Lydia Richards said.

Creating goals in the moment but implementing them on January 1 exhibits one of the many issues of New Year’s resolutions. Pushing goals to the future diminishes their importance. A reason will always exist as to why the goal can wait, but if the goal holds true meaning, it deserves focus and hard work immediately, regardless of the date at which it was made.

Despite the abundant flaws New Year’s resolutions possess, the New Year itself calls for celebration. Much can happen in one year, as we learned from 2017, and there remains only one resolution to make for the New Year: make 2018 your best year yet.