On The Other Hand... (Score 2, Interesting)

While I feel like small, easily measurable, attainable goals are good, I think the exact opposite can work, too - resolve something general that can be a bunch of different things and is something that even if you don't totally achieve, you can at least make progress towards. And rather than being something you can put off, or start to fail at or give up on, it should be something that if you have a bad day, week, or month, you just pick up where you left off. Losing weight, getting in shape, healthier eating habits, quitting smoking are all forms of taking better care of yourself - so just resolve to take better care of yourself, do the positive things you can do, and then at the end of the year you can look back and say "well, I didn't lose weight, but I ate healthier, got more exercise, and I'm actually taking vitamins consistently." For me, like a lot of people, the problem with making small, easily attainable goals is that I do those whenever I feel the need to - and it takes a major life event or feeling like I'm stuck to really assess my life and figure out what big changes I make. Culturally having everyone assessing the past year at the end of the calendar year seems like a good artificial way to encourage that. Any sort of resolution of the type this article suggests I would have started doing when I thought of it, and I feel like intentionally putting stuff off for New Year's just encourages you to continue to put it off after New Year's.