Why Resolutions Fail Us, and What To Do About It

Dear friends, it’s February. According to statistics, the majority of the people who made New Year’s resolutions a month ago have already let those vows slip, slide, or even fall apart completely. Chances are you’re among them. If you are, I’m guessing you’ve experienced moments of discouragement or even feelings of failure, and we’re only thirty-one days into 2016.

Let me assure you—you’re not a failure, no matter what state your resolutions are in.

When we at The Glorious Table discussed how we wanted to encourage you at the beginning of 2016, we talked about the annual January barrage of pressure to make the new year a catalyst for becoming a “new you.” We didn’t want to join the throng of publishers, advertisers, websites, and bloggers clamoring to tell you all the ways you can become slimmer, wealthier, smarter, more dateable, or even more spiritual. We didn’t want to offer you yet another perfect-sounding plan for a “better” year.

Instead, we wanted to be the voice that would lean in when the resolutions had fallen away, when you were looking around thinking, It’s February, and none of my strategic plans are working out. Nothing much has changed. Now what am I supposed to do?

We wanted to be the ones to say, Listen, it’s okay that your resolutions are down the drain. Because God has so much more for you.

God is about the slow, ongoing process of making us new day by day, not making us new every January with a detailed plan. His plan, after all, has already been accomplished on the cross. All He wants is to invite us to understand His plan more deeply and how we fit into it just the way we are.

There’s a reason resolutions fail us: because they’re about striving rather than about grace. They’re about the destination rather than the journey.

This isn’t to say that resolutions in and of themselves are a bad thing. We are all called to work on ourselves, to live mindfully and intentionally, to seek God’s will. Having goals can help us move forward. We’re not advocating a year of slovenliness here.

What we are advocating is simply a deeper commitment to the things that truly count, and which can actually move you closer to fulfilling the same goals your resolutions aimed to accomplish: living mindfully, living intentionally, loving yourself and others well.

So if you’re at the end of your resolution rope, join us over the next week as we talk about how to live a life that’s intentional rather than resolutional. We’d love to welcome you to the table.

Harmony Harkema has loved the written word for as long as she can remember. A former English teacher turned editor, she has spent the past seven years in the publishing industry. A novelist and blogger in the fringe hours of her working mom life, Harmony also has a heart for leading and coaching aspiring writers. Harmony lives in Memphis with her car-loving husband and two small daughters. She blogs at harmonyharkema.com.