Students find resolutions for the New Year

By Megan Spencer |Staff Writer|

A New Year’s Resolution is commonly a goal or set of goals someone sets out to accomplish in the upcoming year.

Since it is the beginning of the year, it is only appropriate to have New Year’s resolutions. A new year means new beginnings.

Everyone has a reason why they strive for their particular resolutions. The New Year generates people to look back on the past year, but more importantly looking forward into the future.

This is the time when people reflect on the changes they want to make and resolve with the objective to follow through on those changes.

Students at CSUSB are no exception. I had the opportunity to speak to students on campus about their New Year’s resolutions.

“My goal this year is to improve my GPA. I am determined to achieve this goal because I want to get a Disney internship and they require a 3.0,” said Monique Clarke.

Besides doing better academically students also want to become more involved in their community.

“I didn’t have one last year because I like to make a change each day instead of once a year. This year I decided I want to increase my philanthropy involvement by doing more community service,” said Christina Gonzales.

Sometimes we tend to jump the gun in excitement of a “new” you, but it is important to take small steps to insure your success throughout the full year.

A step you can take for a “new” you can be to eat healthy like Lindsey Simpson. Her resolution is, “to eat healthier by having more fruits and vegetables. That is my first step since last year my goal was to eat healthy by cutting out all junk food and I didn’t succeed. So my new goal is take it one step at a time and slowly cut out sweets.”

Besides eating healthy students also want to get active. Julian Gibson’s resolution is, “to get into boxing and being more successful at it. My personal goal is to box three days a week and train six days a week to ensure my success.”

It is no big surprise that New Year’s resolutions have a track record of deteriorating.

One reason is the allure of starting from scratch. Many feel that the beginning of the year offers a fresh start and a clean slate.

In an article by Marist Poll, they stated that 40 percent of Americans plan to ring in the New Year with a promise to make it better than 2012 and 60 percent were not likely to set a New Year’s resolution at all.

I myself enjoy partaking in the trend and decided to take a crack at improving myself in 2013. My personal goals were to eat healthier and exercise more frequently, as many others tend to strive for.

It was also seen in the Marist Poll that among the Americans who plan to make New Year’s resolutions for 2013, weight loss remains the number one New Year’s resolution.

17 percent promise to lose weight, 13 percent say they will stop smoking, 10 percent would like to be a better person, 9 percent intent to spend less and save more money and 8 percent think they will exercise more.

Whether you like participating in New Year’s resolutions or you leave it to the more optimistic bunch, it is evident that it is all with the hopes of create a better and more successful year then the last.