New Year Resolution

NEW YEAR RESOLUTION: A PERFUNCTORY EXERCISE? At the dawn of each year, many have imbibed the good habit of setting aside few hours to review the past year and resolve to surge better in the nascent year. However, before the advent of the fourth month, many of these resolutions have been relegated to the past. Having experienced this scenario for some years, some people thought it wise not to make any new resolutions again since they have never been faithful to their past ones. It is this intriguing spectacle that made me reflect on the perfunctory nature of most new-year resolutions and the nemesis of not having any resolution at all. The unfortunate thing that will happen to anyone is to set out on a journey without the vaguest idea of one’s destination. One of the lines in Alice in Wonderland reads: “If you’re going nowhere, you’ll surely end nowhere.” Life is so serious a business that one should embark on it annually without any guide or aim. If business men do take stocks of their goods and make witty projections for the future, the situation should be more serious for us. Furthermore, given that the society in this 21st century is growing more complex, it is incumbent on us to be abreast with the changing status-quo, at least. It will be infra-dig if the led should be ahead of the leaders. Life is a continual activity; one either changes or one will be changed. You either choose a particular goal to move towards or any goal will move you; there is hardly a middle position in life. If one sets out for anywhere, one will end up anywhere. On another note, our goals, dreams, resolutions, targets, need not be too low and mediocre. For us to benefit immensely from this annual exercise, our aims have got to be high and noble. We ought not be contended with the barest minimum. In this regard, V. Frankl offers this admonition: “If one sets low ideals for oneself, one will eventually end up in mediocrity. The crosswind of life is constant and often strong. To excel, or at least to be near excellence, one must set very high ideals for oneself” (Psychotherapy and Existentialism: Selected Papers on Logotherapy, p. 106-7). We ought to aim our arrows straight to the sky; we may never reach it but we will surely go farther than the fellow who aims at the roof-top. Besides, we should not be afraid of falling or failing if we make high targets for ‘being is always better than non-being.’ Without taking the risk to venture into new and higher fields, we can never discover nor harvest our potentials. The autobiographies and biographies of historic men are replete with their initial ‘failures’, which later became their stepping-stones. Also in the same spirit, Carl Jung remarked, “All neurosis is the result of the individual’s unwillingness to go through the necessary pain.” Evidently, it is better to wear out than to rust out. Moreover, our future is in our hands. Every one is the architect of his life-story. It is well granted that man is conditioned by his past, yet reason and free-will are the prerogatives of man. With these two wings man can soar higher beyond the limitations of his past. Therefore, the apparent infertility of our past ‘new-year’ resolutions should not deter us from embarking on fresh and higher ones. Rather, it should encourage us to labour perseveringly until our good is better, and our better best. Finally, let us always commend our ideals into the maternal hands of Mary, the star of the sea, that she may intercede for us for that necessary grace to be perfect as our heavenly Father is perfect. © Gabriel C. Amobi