Top Ten New Year’s Resolutions (That You’ll Fail by February)
January is a time for reinvention, getting a new lease on life, and the deep, deep sense of self-loathing that comes with a failure to do either of these things. The first month of the New Year is meant for making false promises and feeling bitter at the smug success stories of yesteryear that acquaintances post on social media. Frankly, maybe its high time we all stopped fooling ourselves and just accepted that personal improvement is a scam invented by the beauty industry and home gym equipment manufacturers. These top ten resolutions are so often abandoned that it’s probably better to – in the words of Homer Simpson – “never try”; and here’s exactly why.
- Lose weight
It must be a fact that we’ll all be better people if we can fit into a size 6 in Topshop (even if that’s a 10 in H&M, you great big tub of butter), or why would celebrity magazines tell us so? Even at that, maybe you could stand to put a bit of meat on your bones. You could do with shinier hair, while you’re at it. Also, how about a decent skincare routine, pasty-face? Or maybe if – you know what, this whole thing is just exhausting. Why bother?
- Run a marathon
What, you think you’re better than me because you can run around in those stupid-looking shorts for a couple of hours? You think you’re all that because you’ve managed to get your life together? You pretentious little shite. The first guy to run a marathon died at the end of it, you know. That was a clear warning against continuing the practice.
- Get organised
I mean, yes, you could clean up that pile of clothes at the end of your bed that’s probably sentient at this point, but does it not give the room character? By removing that little bit of mess, you’re removing a little bit of yourself. Is that what you want? To become a hollow shell of who you once were?
- Quit smoking/drinking
Yeah, right. Next.
- Learn a new language
So, you can sit through a good twelve years of Irish classes just to be able to say “an bhfuil cead agam dul go dtí an leithreas”, and yet are perfectly capable of learning fluent Russian over the next twelve months. Alright.
- Stop procrastinating
Fancy psychologists have done studies on this phenomenon and have found that procrastination is an integral part of some people’s work method, and so if you really want to do well, you should stop fighting it. Think about that the next time you try to start your assignment a reasonable amount of time before the deadline: the only thing you may be getting a head start on is failure, my friend.
- Get proper sleep
This statement is so ambiguous, though. What is “proper”? What is “sleep”? What is “sobriety”? These are the questions that have haunted college students since the dawn of time, and no amount of New Year’s resolutions will provide satisfactory answers. It’s just common sense that people with erratic sleeping patterns are better craic (when they’re not in the middle of a breakdown). Being better craic? Now that’s a resolution we can all get behind.
- Join a gym
Sure, you may not have set foot inside a gym for so long that you pronounce the word as ‘gime’. Sure, what you call exercise some may call ‘standing upright’. Sure, you might technically be capable of going to the gym, but it’s all the way across the road and there are people there and you have to bring, like, a whole towel… echh.
- Write a book
I don’t care whether you plan on penning a saga which will write Lord of the Rings out of history, it’s not worth it. In order to be successful in any venture in this day and age, it’s a well-known fact that you first have to sell your soul to Satan, and there are so many scams floating around the internet nowadays that you can never be sure where the immortal part of yourself will end up.
- Study harder
Listen, we all make crazy promises to ourselves during study week. It’s ok. Nobody really expects you to learn from your mistakes. You’re hardly expected to study every night of the week – otherwise why would you have signed up for a Netflix account? Priorities! BONUS: Learn a new skillIf you try to cook, you’ll probably start a fire. If you try to play an instrument, you’ll probably deafen the neighbourhood cats. If you try DIY, you’ll probably nail your leg to a plank of wood or something. Unless you’re going to work hard at something you enjoy doing, you’ll never be any good at it – and, ew, effort. New experiences are scary, anyway – you’d be better off going through life without them.