Frugal Babe

A rich life without a lot of money

  • Home
  • About me

Why I Don’t Make New Year’s Resolutions

January 3, 2011 By Frugal Babe

Happy 2011!  I hope you all had a nice, relaxing holiday season.  Right now, we’re really enjoying the fact that our holiday decorations were limited to a little Christmas bear hanging on our wall clock, an evergreen bough on top of our kitchen cabinets, and a homemade reindeer ornament that our son’s cousin made for him.  Not much to do in terms of taking it all down!

And that brings us to New Year’s resolutions.  In keeping with our “doing things our own way” style, we don’t do resolutions.   January 1 is a day, just like every other day.  Sure, it’s the start of a new year, but there are plenty of other beginnings we can celebrate too.  12 times each year a new month begins.  52 times each year we get to start a new week, and 365 times each year we get to start a new day.  Maybe it’s because my family doesn’t place a great deal of importance on any holidays (trying instead to make every day special), but January 1 isn’t any more significant to me than February 1.

Instead of resolving to make big changes at the start of each year, my approach is to make changes whenever I think of them, or whenever I’m feeling particularly motivated by something.  And I tend to avoid making too many changes at once.  Sometime in the fall of 2009, I decided to start making our bed every morning when we got up (something I had never done before).  It takes less than a minute to make the bed, but for the rest of the day the room looks great.  This was a simple change, and one that later helped motivate me to be more focused on neatness throughout the house.  These days, I can’t imagine leaving the bedroom in the morning without making the bed.

Last year, sometime in April, I started to be intrigued by the idea of minimalism, purging clutter, and limiting shopping.  I decided to stop going to my favorite thrift stores (except to donate stuff) and vowed to not buy any clothing for the rest of the year.  I have no idea what the specific date was, but I was successful in making that change too.  I very rarely go thrift store shopping anymore (if I do, it’s with a specific purpose, like new winter boots for our son), and I haven’t bought any clothes since April.  Of course, I was able to drag my box of maternity clothes up from the basement a couple months ago, so it’s sort of like I got a whole new wardrobe anyway…

It was also sometime last spring when I decided to stop spending valuable time and mental energy reading the news.  That was another very good change, and although the start of it didn’t coincide with any significant calendar date, I’ve been able to (mostly) stick with it.  (I say mostly because I do still have to spend a chunk of time each day online for work, and sometimes I find myself clicking on links that end up being time/energy wasters.  But I’m much more able to recognize those for what they are now, and get myself back on task relatively quickly).

There are lots of reasons why most New Year’s resolutions are doomed to failure.  Some people try to take on too many things at once.  We all know someone who resolves to stop smoking, start exercising for an hour a day, give up soda, lose 20 pounds, and start meditating every morning… all on January 1.  For a very small percentage of people, making multiple radical changes at one time works quite well.  But for most people, it’s likely to be overwhelming.  I think that another reason resolutions made on January 1 tend to fail is because the date really is just another day.  There’s a lot of hype around the start of a new year, but it’s no easier to make major changes on January 1 than it is on March 23rd.  There’s nothing magical about January first.  Making changes in our lives requires just as much effort now as it would two months from now.  Sometimes I think that people make resolutions on January 1 simply because everybody else is doing it, rather than out of a deep desire to change something.  It might make more sense to make changes when the motivation strikes, regardless of the date on the calendar (January 3rd is just as good as January 1st!)

If you’re looking for a little inspiration in terms of making positive changes in your life, check out this article from Minimalist Mom.  And don’t worry about what the calendar says.  At any point in our lives we can make changes, both big and small, that will put us on a better, more rewarding path.  Listening to ourselves and paying attention to what we really want out of life is more likely to motivate us than the dawning of a particular day on the calendar.

Filed Under: clutter, goals, just my life, other bloggers 4 Comments

Comments

  1. Molly On Money says

    January 3, 2011 at 8:46 pm

    I do frugal well, minimal….not so great. I just came across an article in Sunset Magazine about a woman in CA who is trying to live with zero waste. Rather than reuse, reduce, recycle she lives by refuse, refuse, refuse (referring to items coming into her home). You should check her out. Her name is Bea Johnson.

    Reply
  2. Rachel says

    January 4, 2011 at 1:25 pm

    Thanks for the link =)
    So wise. And so right. It’s not about January 1st. It’s about every day and finding inspiration and motivation in the moment and then running with it.
    I am 50/50 on making the bed. I want to be 100.

    Reply
  3. Jackie @ My Zero Dollar Christmas says

    January 5, 2011 at 8:31 am

    I really love this. We also don’t do resolutions. But this year is the year for change. My husband and I have decided to save, save, save. We’ve come to the stark realization that we don’t want to be parents who can’t put their kids through college (causing them to rack up a lot of debt before they even enter the workforce). We are starting a college fund for all 4 of our children (with our oldest being 11, she gets double the amount deposited since she will enter first and we have no savings for her….) We are also doing a ZERO dollar Christmas. Simply put, we won’t spend any money out of pocket on gifts this year. There are tons of freebies throughout the year coupled with SwagBucks and other earning sites and reward sites that we will use instead. This will help tremendously. I kind of feel like, if we can’t get it free or extremely cheap, we don’t need it! Feel free to swing by my blog. I’d love to have your comments or suggestions.

    Jackie

    Reply
  4. Kyle @ Rather-Be-Shopping says

    January 10, 2011 at 11:03 am

    Great post. What a cool way to look at life and new beginnings. A deep desire to change something in your life can happen whenever you want it to, not only on Jan 1. Thanks for reminding us of that.

    Reply

Leave a Reply Cancel reply

Your email address will not be published. Required fields are marked *

Great eBooks:

Recent Comments

  • Chris on Still Here, Still Frugal!
  • Cassie on Still Here, Still Frugal!
  • James High on $20 Window Well Makeover
  • Kay on Still Here, Still Frugal!
  • BigMama on Still Here, Still Frugal!
Shop for Fashion Dresses on DHgate

Organifi coupon

Recent Posts

  • Still Here, Still Frugal!
  • Goodbye, mortgage!
  • Achieving our goals, thanks to long-term frugality
  • Still here!
  • An update from our frugal corner of the world

Blogroll

  • Brave New Life
  • Budgets Are Sexy
  • Early Retirement Extreme
  • Green Baby Guide
  • Kristen’s Raw
  • Mr. Money Mustache
  • Nature Moms Blog
  • No Impact Man
  • Penniless Parenting
  • Personal Budgeting
  • Pleasantly Poor
  • Sense To Save
  • Simple Mom
  • Stop Buying Crap
  • Surveybag
  • The Good Human
  • The Thrifty Chicks
  • Tight Fisted Miser
  • Ultimate Money Blog


  • See Store Coupons
    • All Coupons
    • Amazon Coupons
    • Apple Coupons
    • Best Buy Coupons
    • Buy.com Coupons
    • Dell Coupons
    • HP Coupons
    • Newegg Coupons
    • Office Depot Coupons
    • Staples Coupons
    • TigerDirect Coupons
  • See Category Deals
    • All Deals
    • Laptop Deals
    • Netbook Deals
    • Cell Phone Deals
    • TV Deals
    • GPS Deals
    • Camera Deals
    • iPod Deals
    • Tablet Deals
    • eReader Deals
    • iPhone Deals
d9533814e829a2b88025d710cb92afab-332