New Year’s Resolution

BC“s call for New Year’s Resolutions that I’m making for myself, or that I’d want someone else to make for themselves has me in a bit of a pickle. I hardly ever bother with New Year’s resolutions – in my younger days I’d generally pick something grandiose that wouldn’t ever get done or happen, and that got me out of the habit. As you get older, you learn to break down problems into smaller more manageable bites to where you don’t get overwhelmed by them and quit. Maybe I ought to look again at New Year’s resolutions in that light, and pick smaller ones, rather than one like learning French.

There’s something for the resolutions too, for some one thing or another to improve the world. They’re fairly common and there’s not a thing wrong with them. Just pick the right thing to do, and do it; I’m with that. But they are kind of small and easy, most of them. Pick a little bigger one, OK? Or maybe two?

But you also learn as you get older is that the only person in the world you can change is yourself, and that ain’t easy; it takes a lot of time too, and it doesn’t always work. And when you get down to it, most New Year’s resolutions are about trying to change yourself. All the resolutions that involve your doing something fun or interesting are going to happen anyway; all the resolutions about anything else are about changing yourself. BC“s asking for a New Year’s resolution for someone else goes hard against the plain reality that you can’t change someone else and that you shouldn’t try. That and asking people to be different or better is just the same sort of wishful thinking like what you’d do if you had a million dollars. It is a pointless, time-killing diversion.

But these years I’m solidly middle aged, and I’ve learned some other things getting there. The most important thing that I’ve learned that would tie into a New Year’s resolution is how hard being a decent and upright human being is in American society. I swear that the unofficial motto of the US is: “Well, there’s me the person, and me the job.” Myself, I always thought the Almighty thought different there. We can’t get away from that endemic ugliness. But there are all sorts of small decencies and kindnesses you can do that you don’t necessarily have to do that you should – most of them involve opening your eyes and not doing the shoving-your-way-to-the-front-of-the-line sort of things we do too often, that our greedy and materialistic society pretty much tells us to do. Instead, there are things like opening doors for people and letting people in at traffic* – and doing these small things more – is a good New Year’s resolution because not only are you doing something small but useful to make the lives of people in this world better. And at the same time, you are doing something small to make yourself a better person. And keeping your eyes open for the small things to do – well there’s one hell of a lot to be said for keeping your eyes open more and paying attention more anyway. That is a resolution for self-improvement and world improvement that’s within reach. Think about it, and think about it in your daily living after New Year’s, too.

If you want to do the one-act things for making this a better place, here are my suggestions:

There are lots of good one-act things to do. Do one. Or two. And if you can round up someone else to do these things with, well that’s even better, and you should try to.

That’s my take on New Year’s resolutions. Happy New Year to all of BC“s staff, and to all its readers, too.