Battling New Year's Resolutions

A lot of people undergo the practice of creating new year's resolutions for themselves. We hear the usual litany of going on a diet, quitting smoking, drinking less, being a one man/woman person, excelling in their studies or jobs, spending less on shopping --- the resolutions are focused on being a better person than they were in the year that has passed. Some seem to write it on water, for no sooner than a few days they have managed to demote their self-esteem to low levels by breaking their resolutions. Others have a determination with a glow of a burning candle and trace their resolves on sand, but they can only hold out for a certain length of time until the wind blows and snuffs the candle out and shifts the sand. A select few manage to cast their resolutions on stone with great effort and determination. If they don't die in the process (I know one person who died of a diabetic shock because she went on a diet and she didn't know she was a diabetic), they emerge triumphant.

Making and accomplishing New Year's resolutions is a war in itself. It's like a fortified medieval superpower where individuals who make resolutions are the battlefield tacticians and generals. It is not an easy conquest: many have tried, but few have succeeded.

And I am not among those who make New Year's resolutions. I'm no war general.