Should You Make New Year’s Resolutions?

Do you believe that a new year brings a new you? Some people make New Year’s resolutions and set new goals for the new year. January 1st is a reminder to turn over a new leaf and to make a list of self-improvement goals. And for some ambitious people who like New Year’s resolutions, the first of January is a time to reflect on the past year and see how many of their resolutions from the past year were achieved.

Now, if you’re one of those who cringes when you think of the resolutions that you abandoned in the first months or (gasp) the first month of the outgoing year, you’re pretty normal. According to the Pew Research Center, at the start of 2024, “Of the 70% of Americans who did not make any New Year’s resolutions this year, a majority (56%) say their main reason for not doing so is they simply do not like to make resolutions.”

In the same survey, the Pew Research Center found that “Three-in-ten Americans report making at least one resolution this year, with half of this group making more than one.” The numbers aren’t high. 

I used to make a list of ten New Year’s resolutions in January, and in December of that year, I was usually dismayed to find that perhaps only three of the ten items were completed and maybe an additional two were started and not finished. Perhaps I set the bar too high for myself. Or maybe I needed to review that list more often than twice a year. After a few years of making resolutions, I quit. They weren’t lists of resolutions. They were lists of dreams!

If you can make New Year’s resolutions and accomplish them in twelve months, that’s amazing! I’ve found it more practical to make a weekly to-do list. Maybe it’s the same thing, but the terminology (“to-do”) certainly seems less intimidating. Stuff that you just have to do is more bite-sized than Resolutions that have a vow-taking status.

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Do Think More About the Future or the Past?

You can tell someone’s age by how much they think about the future or the past.

When we’re kids, time is slow, like moving through water. It’s a huge milestone to be six years old, then six and a half, and then seven. A two-month summer vacation lasts a lifetime. When you’re nine, a twenty-year-old adult is just old, and a grandparent has been around since the beginning of time. It’s going to take forever before we can grow up and be free to do whatever we want without the approval of our parents.

I’ve noticed that teenagers and people in their twenties talk about the future as if there is a lot of time ahead of them. They have post-secondary education goals, first career-related job discussions, and first romantic relationships. They ask questions such as: How do I start my career? How do I know if he likes me? What should I put on my resume? Where should I travel? The world is new, and people want to try things out and explore them. Some act like they are invincible because they are young. Others dwell on their first heartaches: a breakup with their high school crush. Pain from not getting into the college of their dreams. Anger at not being trusted to drive their first car or host a party with their friends and no parents. They have memories of childhood, school, and first-time life experiences.

People who are in their forties and fifties seem to speak equally about the future and the past. They realize they shouldn’t waste what time they have left. Either they are at the peak of their career and financial stability or they plan to get there soon. Their children are grown or will be grown up. When they’re middle aged, they think about retirement plans. At this time, they’re fighting the aging process while taking care of aging parents. Behind them, they have more memories and years than they did in their twenties. They remember friendships and romances that didn’t work out. They’ve survived divorces. They painfully remember missed chances: it’s harder to learn new languages, play a sport, or learn a new musical instrument. They’ve been to weddings and funerals. They fondly remember what it was like to be young and invincible back when they didn’t hear of so many tragedies. Most importantly, they feel empowered by their life experience.

Seniors talk about the past a lot. They reminisce about how life used to be, how much things used to cost, and all the wonderful memories of the people they had known and the places they had been over the years. Their memories are like a finished book that they can open and read. They value the preciousness of time because the chances they had to accomplish what they could are mostly behind them. Seniors in their 90s and older value each additional morning because they don’t know how many more of them they have remaining. Time is more important than money, because when you’re a senior, you realize that a decade can pass in one eye blink.

So, to return to the question, “Do you spend more time thinking about the future or the past?” I think it depends on the individual, but certainly, your age affects how long the path stretches ahead of you and how far it goes behind you.

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Do You Think About the Future or the Past?

Santa’s Top Skills Revealed

This interesting and timely article dropped into my mailbox: a blog about the soft skills needed to run Santa’s worldwide business. Soft skills are skills such as leadership, active listening, critical thinking, and multitasking.

Here are just some of the highlights from the longer article about what skills Santa uses to run his global gift operation.

Leadership skills: he directs talented elves and a herd of magical reindeer and coordinates with families during one night of operations.

Multitasking skills: Santa can’t miss that one deadline per year, so he has a lot to coordinate, from tuning up the sleigh to reading all the gift lists and managing the toy shop.

Active listening skills: Santa listens carefully to all the children so he gets the details for their wish lists right, and he asks questions when needed for the best interaction possible. He pays attention to body language and the way the child is feeling.

Santa possesses many soft skills that are needed to run such an important gift operation.

For more about these skills, check out the original article.

Is AI Good or Bad for Writers

In a previous post, I wrote about the advantages and disadvantages of AI. Today, this very charged but relevant topic will get a part 2! 

Recently, I read a discussion in a writing group about the impact of AI on writing jobs. The overall consensus was that jobs for writers are and will be affected. Topics that AI can’t write well will continue to be written by human writers. However, pieces that AI can generate are the most likely to replace human writers. For example, Top 10 lists, entertainment pieces, generic communication, and basic research for writing projects. 

The type of writing that AI cannot reproduce requires human contact and a knowledge of technological advancements; for example, writers who produce how-to guides about the use of new technology. AI may not have access to the knowledge or vocabulary to explain how to operate such technology. 

Similarly, AI cannot interview people and produce a piece of writing that includes the opinions of those interviewees. This human interest angle cannot be replicated with AI unless those interviews are already in the public domain. 

Tech companies that aim to increase the number of clients they serve need to generate tech-related content at a speed that is too fast for humans to achieve unless they employ several humans working around the clock. From a project management perspective, that would be a headache, especially considering that they must hire content specialists who demand a high price tag. It would be more cost efficient to employ a smaller staff of writers who can check the authenticity of the AI while increasing the company’s output to serve more clients. In other words, writers who are tech savvy will be one type of writer who will thrive in an AI world. 

Is AI good or bad? From this focus on the impact of AI and the writing fields, it is clear that AI will replace jobs. Some writers won’t find work for certain types of writing projects. But AI will also create and maintain jobs. The trickle-down effect of AI is thus both harmful and beneficial. 

What do you think about this topic?