Resolutions again? Yes, we cannot run from them

I had one of those conversations we call small talk about the end of year with Susan, a light skinned administrator at one of the Uganda Water and Sewage Corporation branches where I usually pay my water bills. Susan appreciates how far she has come this year and is very anxious for the New Year to roll in. But top on her agenda in the coming year, is the desire to get married. When I asked her whether she had a boyfriend who was looking to settle, she simply nodded her head and said she can always get one… sigh.

Redundant?
Setting New Year resolutions at the beginning of every year has become a tired song in many people’s ears. It has fast become one of those things we do when the year sets in and quickly forget as time flies by. Every end of year, people make long lists of what they hope to achieve in the coming years, only to be disappointed when they fail to achieve even a quarter of their set targets.

But yet again, the learned people will say life without a dream is useless and in order for you to move forward, you must have a direction and focus. And this is where resolutions come in handy. New Year resolutions act as a check in life. It also gives us admittance to a privileged view of our selves. Rather than being blown by the wind, setting goals can steer and give us options about the different paths on where we want to go.

Davis Rwendire, a supermarket owner in Namuwongo, says 2013 has been his year. “I have achieved most of the things I had resolved to do in the previous year. For others like Edward Kaweesa, it has become useless for him to set resolutions because he gives up on them halfway in to the year.

How to set goals
Resolutions should always be all round and affect every aspect of your life. Langa advises on setting goals that will not just cause you to develop only in one area of your life but all areas of your life. This way, he explains, one will make sure that one has a balanced growth. Your resolutions should be able to impact your social, economic life, -affect your friends, relatives, family and all aspects of your being.

Most people set resolutions which are far beyond their capacity and as such make it almost impossible to achieve them. Start small and you keep on adding up to your life. “Take care of the small pennies, and let the dollars take care of themselves.”

Make your mistakes but never fail to learn from them, for in making them, it shows we are trying out new things.

Melody Beatie an author said “The new year stands before us, like a chapter in a book, waiting to be written. We can help write that story by setting goals.”

Steven Langa, a counselor argues that every year gives us an opportunity to audit ourselves. Resolutions are goals that help to guide us in our daily life. The only difference is that they are bound by one year which is a limiting factor.
Langa adds that January is a wonderful month for many of us. “It’s a new month and as such, it opens new doors of boundless possibilities for us. It is not just a fresh start for us, but presents us with another opportunity to evaluate ourselves - by looking back in the year that has passed and also set resolutions for the New Year.

However, one thing most people do wrong is setting goals just for the mere sake of setting New Year resolutions. These resolutions must usually have something attached to them. It could be derived from your experience in the previous year.

Samuel Bitaine, an artiste says people’s realities differ with a person’s perspective. Experiences shape up a person’s resolution. He warns that if you choose to look at possibilities as impossibilities before setting resolutions, then that mentality prohibits you from achieving those goals.

Langa warns against bad habits like procrastination, which often causes us to push what we could do today to a later date. This, given the limited time span for achieving these resolutions, robs us of the valuable time we could have used to build on realising what you have planned. “Having a successful year begins with having a successful day, a successful week and successful month, which eventually builds up to a successful year,” he says.

Road to success
Here are some tips on how to achieve your goals

• Make your goals specific.
Choose a figure or number, for instance a time period like six months, or if you are planning on losing weight, zero in on the kilogrammes you would love to reduce to.

• Make it realistic.
You are not superman, that is for sure. Dream about things you can grasp to avoid frustrations.

A realistic goal is something you want for yourself that can be achieved; an unrealistic one is something you wish to become or have based on how you want people to see you. It is rooted on others’ definition of who you are or who you must be, and thus, makes the New Year’s resolution or goal unrealistic.

• Make it known.
Those who have been successful with their New Year’s resolutions got by with a little help from people around them. It could be their closest friends, people from work, a mentor or their family. By making your aspiration known to others, who play a significant role in your life, you get support along the way.

• Make it measurable by time.
Deadline might be a stressful word for some. But if you are setting New Year’s resolutions with no time frame in mind, chances are, you have the rest of this century to achieve it!

• Make it fun and rewarding.
Setting New Year’s resolutions are not meant to be punishments or agonising efforts. People must choose to put the “fun” element, instead of hoping it is fun to go through all the emotional roller-coaster of change. This means putting fun or choosing to have fun while achieving a better self! For instance, to eat healthy, you could learn new ways of cooking.

As for setting New Year’s resolutions that are rewarding, look ahead again and look deep within you. If the picture of successfully achieving that goal puts a smile to your face right away, and feel a sudden desire to do something meaningful right then, that goal is indeed rewarding!

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