Although many of us come up with a not so hard resolution, we can never follow through with it. Why? Well, it’s simpler than it may appear, most people in today’s society are afraid of changing because of what others might think or because we ourselves are scared of what we could potentially change into. Residents of the Chardon community spoke up about the topic of change and New Year’s resolutions and what they had to say is very eye-opening.

 2020 is upon us as well as the time for change is approaching. But to many, this is only a thought instead of a reality, in fact, about 80% of people fail with doing their resolutions after the second week in February (Mulvey,Insider Picks).

To take it further, looking into the different mindsets that people have and how we think and process how to live our lives. To some life is in a constant loop, waking up at the same time and doing the same things each and every day.  “It never ends, that feeling! Our entire life could feel like this if we never find out what we want to do with our life.” said senior, Ellie Evans, has some info on this topic; she states, So if we were to add something new to that routine to which we aren’t used to it confuses us and causes us to drop the new activity or resolution we had planned for the new year.“I feel like if I don’t work out I just lose a little bit of what I have worked so hard on. I know some people are like addicts to the gym but I try not to overdo it because there are other things to life than just having a good body.”,  Luke Samuel stated. He knows that adding new things into your life doesn’t mean that we have done enough. As people, we have to keep growing and making our lives better. Even if the activity or new addition into the routine is somewhat minor, we aren’t used to it and afraid that it could throw us off and cause something new and unknown to happen in our life.  

Maybe something happens, after making the resolution after going through with it for a while, that causes you stress and anxiety. Maybe you can’t take the constant working out. A lot of maybes could put off your resolution; it’s all an excuse for us to fall back into the regular schedule of our lives that we are comfortable with. This happens because we aren’t used to changing and changing ourselves, even if for the better. “Before people decided to try something new, that being working out or going to a yoga class, they need to just do it before making the effort to keep doing it.”, Erin Moore stated when asked her about people’s mindset when it comes to change. What she meant by this is that we need to just jump into new things before making the goal of doing it every day, so that we know if we can and or can’t keep up with it. “There are two types of stress that people can have, one being distress which is what most people think of when stress and the other being Eustress which is healthy for us to have. Eustress usually happens when we go out and try new things, which allows us to be excited and anxious at the same time, but most people just see it as stress so they stop and continue doing the new resolution planned.”  Distress is the negative things that we worry about like having to feed your kids, having an abusive boyfriend/ girlfriend, and getting to work on time. The other type of stress is eustress that is healthy for people to have. It helps push ourselves to feel anxious to start something new and be happy to do it. Life is all about trying new things before it’s our time to leave this place we call home, so why not try new things and put ourselves out there and try to live a happy and exciting life. 

Life is full of ups and downs; living in this constant state of repetition, our daily routine, and feeling comfortable shouldn’t be the goal in life. Learning to change our mindset and expand our belief that change is okay and nothing to be afraid of, can and will allow us to make our resolutions to which being for the new year or just anytime throughout the year a possibility.