Over the years, New Year’s resolutions have become established as a well-known tradition in society. Many people and families kick off the year by committing to self-improvement, and focus heavily on motivating themselves to make positive changes in the coming months.

As of currently, the tradition has been around for over 4,000 years, and was first practiced by the ancient Babylonians, according to History.com in an article addressing the history of New Year’s resolutions. Originally, the intention behind the practice tied into religion and making promises to gods, but as time has progressed, resolutions have evolved into the dedication towards bettering oneself. In modern times, people often commit to productive changes along the lines of working out more frequently or maintaining a better attitude around others.

A vast majority of people who are familiar with resolutions see them as an opportunity to take advantage of, all the while others have viewed the practice with a different response. Colin Rak-Amico, a senior from Cam High, believes that the act of declaring a New Year’s resolution is meaningless and does not hold any real value.

“People push resolutions off until the new year just to give up on them. A resolution should not be made because a new year is here, it is a change for the betterment of one’s life and that should not be postponed for something such as a new year,” said Rak-Amico. “‘New year, new me’ is nothing more than a saying; you can be a new you at any moment, so they should not revolve around a new year.”

Like Rak-Amico, many others dismiss the tradition and strongly believe in seizing the moment whenever the chance is presented; they would rather do so than use New Year’s Day as an excuse to procrastinate making a change for the better. With this in mind, though, there are also people, such as Cam High senior John Labsilica, who prefer to see the importance of resolutions, all while acknowledging the fact that they can create unrealistic goals when not taken seriously.

“I think they are important just as long as you are actually going to make a commitment to that goal; it make you feel good about yourself. I think a possible way of them backfiring on you is if you simply did not even commit to it or try to,” said Labsilica. “My resolution is to start off the year by meeting more people and living life to its full potential.”

Whether or not New Year’s resolutions are a necessary or important part of the holiday season has been debatable for quite some time, and those who do believe in turning the practice to their advantage continue to do so this month as the world rolls into 2021.