Key to keeping resolution right outside your door
12/24/2016 Bozeman Daily Chronicle, Guest Column by EJ Porth, GVLT
The holidays. It’s party-going, gift-buying, family-visiting mayhem. And after we’ve eaten all the cookies and drunk all the nog, we start fresh with a new year, a blank slate, an opportunity to do better, be better.
Resolutions are not purely post-holiday guilt-ridden phenomena; they’ve been part of human nature since the beginning of time. In the medieval era, knights took the “peacock vow” at the end of the Christmas season to reaffirm their commitment to chivalry. And at the beginning of each year the Babylonians made promises to their gods to return borrowed objects and pay off debts.
You’ve probably heard about, or experienced, the success rates for New Year’s resolutions. They say that only 8 percent of people who make resolutions will remain committed at the end of the year, 73 percent with a fitness related will goal give up, and 1 in 3 people will lose dedication to their resolution within the first month. There is however, a silver lining. People who make New Year’s resolutions are 10 times more likely to follow through with a goal than people who do not.