This last month of the calendar year is full of reflection on how we want the next year to be different – changes we want to make and new goals. New Year’s resolutions are a popular way to state our intentions. Unfortunately, the weight-loss industry has a LOT of ideas for us, and outsized influence on resolutions. The stigmatizing messages that the body you currently have should be different are everywhere, and selling us diet plans and weight loss drugs makes these companies a great deal of money.  These messages can interfere with our enjoyment of end-of-year festivities and set us up for potential harm in the New Year.

I recently came across a 2018 article written by author, podcaster and fat activist Aubrey Gordon that I found helpful for reexamining New Year’s resolutions. Considering her “failure” at past weight loss resolutions, Gordon writes:

Mine was a life of abundance, but I could only see its lack. And New Year’s Eve and Day became my meditation retreat: a time to focus on the self-flagellation I believed I had earned. Over the years, New Year’s became a time of deep sadness — one that took days to move through.

For some, New Year’s resolutions can seem confining, trite or even silly. For others, they can seem pointless, knowing the data on how few people stick with their resolutions for any length of time. Some, like Gordon, find freedom in opting out.

And then, in college, I just stopped. . . I didn’t make peace with my body. I didn’t learn to love it, didn’t radically embrace it. I simply allowed myself to stop thinking about it. And suddenly, I felt so free. That’s when I stopped making new year’s resolutions.

But what if the “failure” rate has more to do with the types of resolutions we are making – ones given to us by others (looking at you, weight-loss industry) – rather than ones that come from within, according to our own values?  Gordon continues,

In my mid-twenties, after a long break, I returned to resolutions. There was still such utility in them: taking time to take stock, correct course, more fully live my values, and more exuberantly pursue my blossoming young life. So I started making resolutions again — this time, not about my body, but about my character.

A recent online discussion with some colleagues and fellow body liberation activists got us to wondering about weight-neutral New Year’s resolutions.  Some of us weren’t fans of doing them at all, but when we dug into resolutions for a broader definition of health and well-being, and considering both ourselves and our communities, the naming of our goals became easier.  When we separated our resolutions from the co-opting of this cultural tradition by the weight-loss industry, alignment with our values came into focus. Hopefully, this list will inspire a positive and health supporting approach to your New Year’s resolutions, creating the life we want, rather than the one we are avoiding or afraid of.