New Year 2026-Will You Be Making a Resolution?

Many of us might be contemplating making a New Year resolution as we head towards the end of 2025, many of us will have done this in past years. Some of us will be feeling happy/sad about the past twelve months, will be feeling we need to modify something in our lives to be more satisfied with ourselves or in order to get on better with others or do more for those we know, or indeed for society in general. But just how many of us have kept these ‘promises to self’ and how many of us understand the origins of this social concept?

In this first article we explore the aetiology of making new year pledges and consider in the second how to be more successful in achieving what we aspire to achieve.

New Year resolutions are most common in the Western World but are also found in the Eastern World, in which a person resolves to continue good practices, change an undesired trait or behaviour, accomplish a personal goal, or otherwise improve their behaviour at the beginning of a calendar year.

Around 40% of people worldwide make New Year resolutions, although intentions vary across cultures.

In Japan, the focus is on self-improvement and personal growth, while in some African countries, resolutions often involve community-based ideas.

The origins of the tradition are rooted in religion. Around 2000 B.C., the Babylonians celebrated a 12-day festival called Akitu (starting with the vernal equinox) as their New Year.  This coincided with the start of the farming season and planting of crops, crowning their king, and making promises to return borrowed farm equipment and pay their debts.

This Babylonian New Year was adopted by the ancient Romans, as was the tradition of making annual resolutions. The timing, however, eventually shifted under Julius Ceasar in 46 B.C., with January 1st declared as the start of the new year. Indeed, the Romans began each year by making promises to the god Janus, after whom the month of January is named.

In medieval times knights took the “peacock vow” at the end of the Christmas season each year to re-affirm their commitment to chivalry.

At ‘Watchnight’ services, (also called Watchnight Mass), a late-night Christian church service, opportunity is provided for Christians to review the year that has passed and make confession and then prepare for the year ahead by praying and resolving. The services often include singing, praying, exhorting, preaching, and Holy Communion. Many Christians prepare for the year ahead by praying and making such resolutions. In Methodist Christianity, the liturgy used for the watchnight service for the New Year is the Covenant Renewal Service; in addition to being traditionally held on New Year’s Eve, many churches offer the Covenant Renewal Service on both New Year’s Eve and on the morning of New Year’s Day.

Thus, this tradition has many religious parallels. During Judaism’s New Year, Rosh Hashanah, through the High Holy Days and culminating in Yom Kippur (the Day of Atonement), one is to reflect upon one’s wrongdoings over the past twelve months, and both seek and offer forgiveness. People can act similarly during the Christian liturgical season of Lent. The concept, regardless of creed, is to reflect upon self-improvement annually.

In 1671 the diary of Anne Halkett, (c. 1623 – 1699), also known as Lady Halkett, an English religious writer and auto biographer, includes an entry on January 2 titled “Resolutions”, which contained a number of religious pledges taken primarily from bible verses, such as “I will not offend anymore.”

By the beginning of the 19th century, the tendency of people to make and fail to keep, resolutions were commonly known and satirized.

An early instance of the complete phrase “new year resolution” is found in a January 1st issue of a Boston newspaper from 1813:

“And yet, I believe there are multitudes of people, accustomed to receive injunctions of new year resolutions, who will sin all the month of December, with a serious determination of beginning the new year with new resolutions and new behaviour, and with the full belief that they shall thus expiate and wipe away all their former faults”.

At the end of the Great Depression, about 25% of American adults formed New Year resolutions. At the start of the 21st century, about 40% did. In fact, according to the American Medical Association, approximately 40% to 50% of Americans participated in the New Year resolution tradition from the 1995 Epcot and 1985 Gallup Polls. A study found 46% of participants who made common New Year resolutions such as losing weight, undertaking exercise programs or stopping smoking were likely to succeed, over ten times as much as those deciding to make life changes at other times of the year.

So, are you contemplating New Year resolutions? If so, the next article will provide some suggestions to help you to maintain your efforts.

(Source: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/New_Year%27s_resolution)