I know, I know, you are above making a New Year's resolution. You are far too disciplined and focused, and you are better than having to make resolutions. If you want something bad enough, you aren’t the type of person to wait until the end of the year to drunkenly proclaim to your friends how you are going to fix your life starting tomorrow. You are above the rest of the world because YOU are a bodybuilder.
The rest of the people in the mortal world have things they might not like about themselves, things they do that aren't healthy, and they may not like how they look or feel. They only wish they could be as secure with themselves as bodybuilders and make all of the right decisions. Instead, they self-loathe through the holidays and like to take advantage of the “clean slate” that a new year provides, and so they make resolutions.
Yes, most people fail miserably with their poorly thought-out ideas, weak plans, and grandiose proclamations of how they are going to change their lives. In fact, a very high percentage fails by not even making it a full week into the New Year. So what? I am unsure why anyone would look down on someone for simply wanting to make changes in their lives and then judging them on the timing of doing so. It isn't because resolutioners fail; bodybuilders fail all the time at managing money, relationships, parenting, not being narcissistic dicks, and a myriad of other things. Because they have cornered the market on eating right and staying relatively lean, they are apparently experts on who is serious about their goals and who is not.
Admittedly, I do not have a habit of making resolutions for the New Year. I did, however, inadvertently make a resolution seven years ago and I have stuck with it ever since. I will likely never revert back and I am quite proud of my decision to do so.
Seven years ago I was in Michigan spending time with my family for the holidays and was drinking quite a bit. I never really had a drinking "problem," in that I was fun when I was drinking and never drank to cope with life. I drank socially and not very frequently. I regularly went months on end without having a drink, but when I did drink, I didn't drink two beers; I drank 15. I rarely got drunk, so I must have been really good at drinking. My mom always taught me to go with my strengths, so I did. The problem was that I found myself drinking pretty much every night for a week in a sort of "I'm here having fun with my family, and drinking is fun, so I am going to drink" way. And it was fun, until I realized that my face was swollen, my hands were so swollen that I couldn't get my wedding ring off, and I just felt like death. It was at that point that I said I would quit drinking in the New Year.
It wasn't intended as a "resolution" really, just a bit of a reprieve from drinking so that I didn't feel like shit for a while. A few months turned into a year, a year turned into a couple of years, and when I didn't drink during our oldest daughter's wedding reception, I figured I had no need or desire to drink anymore. New Year's Day marked seven years — not of "sobriety," because I wasn't a drunk with a problem; I was just a guy who enjoyed drinking socially but felt like death when I did. My hiatus turned into abstaining from alcohol for the last seven years.
Though a lot of people fail miserably, there are those that make resolutions and do stick with them. I have friends that have lost a lot of weight and now live healthy lifestyles after making a resolution. I also have friends that have quit smoking or chewing and others who have started successful businesses or have become charitable, giving their time or money to people who are less fortunate. Even if the success rate is low, why would anyone want to discourage or complain about the timing that someone chooses to make a life-changing decision? Is it because they are in some way weak for not doing it in the middle of July? Or is it simply because you are a judgmental dick and have to belittle someone for not having the discipline for making the change sooner? It is likely the latter.
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I would encourage those who look down upon resolutioners to instead take a long, hard look at themselves instead. Where some of us don't think we need a resolution, some of us are dead wrong. Maybe resolve to do less judging of others and look inward? While some of us are so caught up in what we look like outwardly (both physically and how we are seen by others), maybe these same people should focus on being more supportive, thoughtful, and less shallow. The impact you could have on someone who comes into the gym to make a healthy and potentially life-altering decision could be the difference between that person failing or pushing on and being successful.
People rarely succeed without encouragement from others. Putting someone down and mocking them doesn't provide any encouragement to be successful or to even take a chance in the first place. A positive word of encouragement in the gym from someone who is in great shape can not only help support that one person, but it can also start a chain where that person ends up helping to encourage and support someone else down the road, as well. This is a potential chain of events that we all have the ability to keep going from person to person if we so decide.
Or, as a dickhead bodybuilder, you can sit back and bitch that someone is taking up space in the parking lot, using the piece of equipment that you need so you can make it through another year looking exactly as you do now, and slowing the gym's Wi-Fi so that "Karma Chameleon" is choppy in your earbuds. Where bodybuilders wish everyone else were a little more like them, I wish bodybuilders were a little more like everyone else: fucking normal, and not so bitchy and pious. Just Sayin'.
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