Resolutions are confusing to me. We crowd the gym in January to abandon the treadmill a few weeks later. We buy fruits and vegetables to eat healthier snacks, and then we binge-eat spicy cheese curls from the vending machine at work. We stock up on books and delete the Facebook app, only to find ourselves scrolling through newsfeeds late at night on our laptop, curious about what high school acquaintances have accomplished lately.

(Tell me I’m not alone here.) 

We can’t resist the fresh start of a new calendar year and the optimism that this year, 2017, is the one in which we get healthy, work out more, read prolifically, eat better, become wiser and more patient with our children, and Live Our Best Lives (thanks, Oprah!).

My personal goal is to write more and to share tips, stories, and essays about modern life as we know it. (You’ll be here to read whatever shows up, right?) 

But I also wondered: What are my friends resolving to do/change/be in 2017? So I asked. Here are seven resolutions from real people:

1. Lose weight.  
   “I have been losing weight. I want to continue so I can keep up with my daughter and set a healthy example for her.”
   “I’d love to lose weight but that is pretty much what I do every year. I feel like January is a bad time for that kind of goal. It is the season for staying inside, huddled under a warm blanket, and snuggling the dog.”
2. Sleep more.
   “My goal is to make sure I am getting enough sleep. Over and over I realize this is the cornerstone to everything else in my life.”
3. Figure out how time works? 
   “2017 is going to be my Year of Time. I’m always late for everything, and it’s because I’m really bad at time. So this year, I want to focus on getting good at time. I don’t know how I’m going to do that yet, because I don’t fully understand how time works, but I’ll start with being more mindful.”
4. Master money habits. 
   “Getting better control over our finances.”
5. Pursue creative hobbies. 
   “I really want to devote my time in 2017 toward two things: 1, getting awesome at playing roller derby and, 2, getting more of my writing published. I’m also very ambitiously planning to start going to bed/getting up earlier to spend weekday mornings working out or writing. I stay up too late.”
6. Read and drink. 
   “I want to start every day with coffee and a book, not my phone and social media.”
7. Do all the things? But mostly gardening and cooking. 
   “Improve patience, refrain from too much overt grumpiness, cook at home more (we’ve been leaning on delivery/take out/fast food way too much), actually establish a decent garden area/container plants, read more, establish healthier habits (get in some exercise, make better food choices, yada yada yada). Make some decent flat biscuits like my grandma used to make, and which I rediscovered in Vivian Howard’s well-written and evocative “Deep Run Roots” cookbook. Grow and cook some turnip greens.”

Do you make resolutions at the start of a year? What’s on your list for 2017? 

Image by Annie Spratt via Unsplash