It felt like the year just started, yet we’re already in March. Everybody is already starting to get comfortable with the 2025 year starting, fully away from the past of 2024. But when this year first started, what did most people try to do during a New Year restart? Aside from the New Year traditions, many have conjured up a new plan to do something more beneficial for themselves or others. This is commonly called a “New Year’s resolution.”

Many New Year’s resolutions include activities such as going to the gym everyday, going outside more, spending less time on devices or more time studying, learning some new skills, and so on and so forth. Either way, it’s a beneficial turn that one starts to immediately do on the new year. However, not all New Year’s resolutions pan out the way it’s expected.

“My previous New Year’s resolution, to be honest, [was] really bad,” said Roman Lopez (12). “I forgot about them after February like it wasn’t important to me, [so] I just forgot about them.”

There are many different types of people who value New Year’s resolutions, and many of them have varying amounts of seriousness and sentiment tailored to the person’s goal. Whether it’s something you dedicate yourself to or a plan destined to fail easily, it’s still a concept that many individuals enjoy.

Starting at the bottom, there are individuals who do it for the sake of it, to do something to kick off the new year with a silly goal. Most of these things would be something ridiculous or foolish.

“Probably the most ridiculous one is to eat more from one of my friends who, basically, just likes eating food,” said Diego Alfaro (11).

A lot of people apply healthy habits to try and start the new year with a great refresh. It’s usually something with a few steps in what society considers ‘normal’ or healthy. There are a wide range of things people strive to do, to improve themselves mentally, physically, or emotionally.

“My New Year’s resolution is to be a better person and to get healthy,” said Lopez. “I think I’m doing good at being a better person, like you compliment people, and do all that type of [good] things.”

However, some people are really dedicated to seeing an improvement in themselves during the new year. It’s definitely a challenge, yet some people have the courage to still keep up so far into the year. Many find it a marked goal to become a greater person than they once were. Although the challenge remains, those who keep going don’t regret their decision.

“[I] know a lot of the people who [didn’t] even make it to this year and weren’t able to improve themselves,” said Alfaro. “And now that we’re living [in] another year, I think now it’s finally the time that we get to improve ourselves.”

Despite this, there is quite a lot of uncertainty for going into the new year, as the previous years, were wild rides. Is a New Year’s resolution just a far-fetched goal or motivation, only to just resume back to old habits? Or would it be a start up to a great year with a new beneficial healthy habit? As it turns out, it depends on one’s mindset.

“It’s not very useful,” Wyatt Rash (11) said. “I mean it’s nice to have goals to set, but if you call it a New Year’s resolution, it just feels like you’re just saying that to say it. If you want to set a goal, actually set the goal and not just be like, ‘Oh I’ll try this!’”

While some say it’s not worthy, others think it’s a great concept to help motivate and set your mind to. There are many different perspectives on the topic of resolutions as there are a complete variety of potential results that could arise.

“I feel like we need to have New Year’s resolutions so that we can have another chance to improve ourselves,” said Alfaro.

Whatever it is, New Year’s resolutions are an old cultural tradition for many to think about what could change differently going into a brand new year. They are goals to help tackle old habits, aspirations to change the old you, and motivation to create a brand new you.

A New Year’s resolution goal is still hard, but many individuals are still determined to achieve it. Even three months into the year, some of the students update that their New Year’s resolution is still holding up.

“It’s going pretty good,” said Alfaro. “I’m making more improvements to my mental health and my maturity and such.”

2025 is still going, and there is still a whole year to try and revive your resolution. There are people out there still achieving their resolutions, so are you up for the challenge to keep up with yours?”