After everyone has had their share of the sparkling grape juice, fireworks, snacks, and staying up to bring the new year in, they wake up to start changing their lives. Or do they?

  According to research done by The Week the University of Scranton in Pennsylvania found that only eight percent of people who set a New Year’s resolution keep it. The same research shows that on average half of New Year’s resolutions are broken half way through the year and a quarter don’t make it through the first week. At the same time, people who make resolutions are ten times more likely to achieve goals than people who don’t bother.

  Resolutions can range from anything. Some examples from the staff of The Wildcat are getting pilot’s license, losing weight, getting back into martial arts, and having a healthy physical and mental lifestyle. These all seem attainable, but only if these people work for it.

  For those who are serious about their resolutions at first, they start off great. For example, those wanting to lose weight and decide they will hit the gym. Most of these people will eventually stop. This goes along with those who eventually just drop their goals.

  There are those who make resolutions at the beginning of the year, some succeed in their goals and others don’t, but there are some who feel that we shouldn’t make one goal for the whole year.

  People make resolutions just because it is the thing that people do around the new year, but they don’t actually change. Maybe some people just make one so they can say “I made a resolution!”

  We feel we will be a better person if we do this. Before we can start to reach our goal, time and life gets in the way and nothing happens. Reality may hit us in the face. Eating healthy is too expensive, exercising is too tiring, I have too much to do, etc . . .

  People need to realize that just because it’s a new year doesn’t mean you have to make a resolution. A resolution is a goal, and a goal can be made at any point during the year. When goals are difficult to achieve and possibly fail, it does not mean you have to give up on trying to achieve that goal. You should pick it back up and try again.

  Habits are hard to change, for anyone. Only when someone works at it can a habit be changed. In order to do this, one must be willing and able to change and work for it.