Forget New Year's Resolutions✨: Start With Reflection, Not Rules 💭🌱

Key Points: 

• People make resolutions because the new year feels like a “fresh start.”

• Resolutions are a way to express what we value.

• Sharing resolutions publicly can shape collective values.

• Social media has turned resolutions into a performance, often highlighting public goals over private ones.

• Young adults (18–29) are the most likely to make resolutions.

• Exercise and wellness dominate resolutions, even if they don’t reflect true personal priorities.

• Seasonal Affective Disorder and winter biology show this is not the season for big behavior changes.

• Winter is best for reflection and rest, not pushing hard on new goals.

• Instead of resolutions, focus on self-reflection and rituals that align with your values and motivations.

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By: Charlee Scott

In 2016, I resolved to never make another New Year’s resolution again. This was a big step for my goal-addicted brain. For years, I had been spinning my wheels in the same familiar cycle: reflecting, planning, perfecting, and then giving up. December 31st had felt like a night of endless possibility, and then February 1st would feel like a wake-up call. 

Only 30% of Americans make New Year’s resolutions [1]. The goal of this article is to get that number to zero. This article breaks down what resolutions really are and why we make them. It examines how social media has turned personal growth into a performance, why the middle of winter is a terrible time to set new goals, and most importantly, what to do instead.

Why We Make New Year's Resolutions and What They Really Mean

New Year’s tends to galvanize people in their goal setting through the “fresh start effect.” When people want to start something new in their lives, they often begin at a temporal milestone [4]. There is no more obvious milestone than the end of one year and the start of another.

Resolutions are not a new idea, nor are they purely the result of marketing or productivity culture. New Year’s resolutions exist as a way for people to express explicit ideas about what they find important and worthwhile in life [2]. They are not inherently good or bad. In fact, 42% of YouGov poll respondents state that making resolutions generally made no difference in whether the upcoming year felt better or worse for them [5].

Still, if you open any social media app this time of year, you’ll be bombarded with New Year's resolution discourse. 

A recent study analyzed the ritual of resolution setting on Twitter across five languages. The findings reveal powerful insights into how values are constructed when resolutions are shared publicly. Researchers described this social media ritual as a perfect “laboratory to explore the formation and dissemination of values” [2].

Publicly sharing resolutions is a hinge point in societies. It is where what matters to the individual begins to shape what matters to the collective.

Social Media and the Pressure to Perform Your Goals

Young adults are more likely to set resolutions than older adults. Forty-nine percent of 18–29-year-olds make resolutions, compared to only 21% of adults aged 50 and older [5]. This demographic difference compounds the social media influence on New Year's resolutions.  

Social media has transformed the practice of New Year's resolutions into a social media ritual, offering greater visibility, interactivity, and reach [2]. Suddenly, our feeds are flooded with the expressions of what this demographic values. The most commonly expressed overall values were effort (21.3%) and the self (20.9%) [2]. 

When we consider the group most likely to be making these resolutions, those values are hardly surprising. Developmentally, young adults are in a stage of life focused on gaining financial stability and understanding themselves as emerging adults.

Still, exercise and physical wellness are the most commonly set resolutions [1][6].

Resolution sharing on social media doesn’t just state explicitly what some people value; it also actively helps shape what people think is important [2]. It is mind-boggling to me that, in the middle of winter, after weeks of holiday eating, our society feels compelled to loudly prioritize exercise and physical wellness through resolutions.

I'm not opposed to goals related to physical wellness, self-improvement, or self-acceptance. I'm just adamantly against setting those goals now.

The Middle of Winter Is the Wrong Time for New Goals

This is the heart of my point. Resolutions are fine. Goals are good. Values? I love them. 

The real reason I would like to never see anyone ever set a New Year’s resolution again is that this simply isn’t the season for life-altering shifts to our identities and routines. The winter blues are not a cultural myth. 

Seasonal affective disorder (SAD) is a DSM-5 diagnosis characterized by increased depressed mood, overeating, and oversleeping [3]. It is linked to reduced daylight, changes in melatonin secretion, and decreased serotonergic activity [3]. Not everyone is affected by SAD. However, even milder manifestations with less severe symptoms than SAD are more common with increasing latitude [3].

Essentially, when it’s cold and dark out, we are biologically inclined to want to sleep, eat, and rest. 

Winter asks our bodies to reflect, not act.  

A Better Way to Enter the New Year

Let's focus on New Year’s rituals that help us enter 2026 with integrity rather than exhaustion. 

Fellow contributor to the blog, Matee, shared that her family makes vision boards on New Year’s Eve instead of resolutions, using creativity and time with loved ones to reflect on what makes them feel authentic. Vision boards create meaning without tying us to rigid SMART goals.

If you have goals for next year, take this time to reflect on how they fit into your life and values. Most resolutions fail because we try to change behavior before mindset.

This month, I took time to review my year. I asked myself what went right, what did not, and what exceeded my expectations. What I found most rewarding was the opportunity to look for themes and patterns in my answers. 

What stood out to me was that, although I initially considered an exercise goal (yes, I fall for the hype too), when I wrote down everything I did, wanted, and enjoyed in 2025, I didn't mention that goal once. 

This is why practices of self-reflection can be more beneficial than simple goal setting.

I could set an exercise goal, but I can't create real change without motivation. My reflection didn’t reveal a lack of motivation for exercise. It revealed my motivation to write, to finish school, and to cultivate deeper connections with family and friends.

You can't force a square peg into a round hole. 

Will I try to use my walking pad every day this year? Probably. Will it be good for my overall health? Definitely. But I’ll do it while I write, while I study, and while I talk on the phone to my sister. 

This is your sign to work with yourself, rather than against yourself. Spend this time finding your whys and the source of your determination. Save the active effort for spring.

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References:

[1] Gracia, S. (2024, January 29). New Year’s resolutions: Who makes them and why. Pew Research Center. https://www.pewresearch.org/short-reads/2024/01/29/new-years-resolutions-who-makes-them-and-why/

[2] Hallinan, B., Kim, B., Mizoroki, S., Scharlach, R., Trillò, T., Thelwall, M., Segev, E., & Shifman, L. (2023). The value(s) of social media rituals: A cross-cultural analysis of New Year’s resolutions. Information, Communication & Society, 26(4), 764–785. https://doi.org/10.1080/1369118X.2021.1983003

[3] Kim, K., Kim, J., Jung, S., Kim, H.-W., Kim, H.-S., Son, E., Ko, D. S., Yoon, S., Kim, B. S., Kim, W. K., Lim, C., Kim, K., Lee, D., & Kim, Y. H. (2025). Global prevalence of seasonal affective disorder by latitude: A systematic review and meta-analysis. Journal of Affective Disorders, 390, 119807. https://doi.org/10.1016/j.jad.2025.119807

[4] Oscarsson M, Carlbring P, Andersson G, Rozental A (2020) A large-scale experiment on New Year’s resolutions: Approach-oriented goals are more successful than avoidance-oriented goals. PLoS ONE 15(12): e0234097. https://doi. org/10.1371/journal.pone.0234097

[5] YouGov. (2025). YouGov survey: New Year's resolutions poll results (December 9–11, 2025) [PDF]. YouGov. https://d3nkl3psvxxpe9.cloudfront.net/documents/New_Years_Resolutions_poll_results.pdf