As we welcome 2025, we thought it might be fun to reach out to the team and ask them to share their New Year’s resolutions. After all, 96 million Americans or 40 percent of our population will make them this year. With that many people following this tradition, you might ask yourself...what’s the history behind this custom?
A Brief History
Let’s go back 4,000 years ago to Mesopotamia where life revolved around Agriculture. The year’s beginning was in March or April as crops began to grow, symbolizing a new beginning. In 46 BC, Julius Ceaser, leader of the Roman Empire, established January 1st as the year’s beginning. And in 1907, the ball drops for the first time in New York City. Why a ball? The tradition comes from ancient sailing. Sailors needed to know what time it was in order to perform the day’s duties.
A Meaningful Tradition
In many cultures, the commitment to making your New Year’s resolutions is a long-standing tradition. They foster a sense of community, because many individuals have similar goals. These goals also encourage you to establish specific, measurable objectives that result in self-improvement. Improvements that can lead to significant long-term benefits, which improve your physical and mental well-being.
Resolution #1 - To cut back, not quit, sugar snacks
Resolution #2 - Return to the mountain bike when the weather breaks. Until then, I’ll be an on the water rower.
I want to simplify and focus.
This year, I would like to focus more on health and fitness. Specifically on building strength for the physicality required to keep up with my two young sons. I would also like to be more intentional with how I spend time with each of my five children. They all have different talents and interests, and I would like to create more individual time with each child.
My resolution this year is to listen! Trying to get back into the habit of listening well and making room to hear from others.
My 2025 New Year’s resolution? I’ve realized that I don’t know how many years on this Earth I’ve got left. I’m gonna get real weird with it.
Practicing gratitude. I’m keeping a gratitude journal and meditation practice. Committed to a minimum of five times a weeks. I write down three things I am grateful for and do 10 minutes of meditation every day.
As a “Zillennial,” I’ve grown alongside the boom of social media. While that advancement in technology has helped get me to where I am today, as I get older, I’ve noticed it tends to thin out my perspective on friendships and relationships. I miss not knowing what everyone is up to all the time and getting to catch up on the week over dinner or a hike with a friend.
As I take a step to be more intentional across the board in the new year, I am taking a step back from the constant “doom scroll” and transporting back to things like letter writing, coffee chats, and road trips with friends. For 2025, I plan to spend more quality time with the community in my life. And, of course, I have a lofty list of books to read.
As I begin 2025, my New Year’s resolutions are to invest time and thought into being healthier. I also want to focus and practice on being more patient.
My New Year's resolution is to spend more time outdoors (hiking, mountain biking, etc.). I also want to read more and work on fine-tuning my jokes.
My New Year’s resolution is to read more books and to keep a book journal. I want to know how much I’ve read and what I read. So, I can have the opportunity to reflect on it at the end of 2025.
For 2025, I've chosen to focus on "Healing the Man in the Past." This theme entails reconnecting with my inner child, processing past traumas, nurturing relationships, and pursuing activities that truly bring me joy.
By focusing on a theme rather than a specific goal, I can also navigate the year in a more fluid and flexible way, avoiding potential pitfalls from the past. As our child has shown me, having kids allows us to see the world from new and precious perspectives. My intention is to continue investing in myself, growing, changing, and transforming for her sake. Happy New Year!
This New Year, I would like to focus on going outside more, being active, eating healthier, getting better sleep, and creating more art. Furthermore, I’d like to practice being more present in the current moments of my life and not worrying about the past or future.
Mine (and I tried to do this a couple years ago and failed)…. If it’s a chore that will take five minutes or less, just go ahead and do it rather than pushing it off until later.
This is a year I want to devote time to more reading and writing, especially fiction. I have a fair collection of poems I’ve committed to paper over the years, as well as a short story about a very special infant that takes place in the mountains of Austria on Christmas Eve. In addition to those efforts, I also have a good start on a fictional novel about a fictional ad agency that takes on a “very” unexpected client. That should keep me busy.
As we sign off, why not make this the year you follow through on your resolutions. And we wish all of you a “Happy and Successful New Year.”
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