Why Bother?

Come the first of every year, people all around the world take a minute to sit down and detail the changes they would like to see in themselves and their lives in the coming year. I've not been any different. Each and every year I make a pledge to do better, be better and behave better. Here are my resolutions for 2006:
Lose weight and don't procrastinate
And 2005:
Lose weight and don't procrastinate
2004:
You guessed it- lose weight and don't procrastinate!
Every year the resolutions are the same but the duration of time for which they remain in my conscience seems to get shorter and shorter. So why am I writing about resolutions when new years was weeks ago? Because it has just come to my realisation that I have managed to break one of my resolutions already. That's right, the first month of the year isn't even up yet and already I'm putting of work with deadlines fast approaching. Its a new record people!!
Which makes me wonder why I, and people in general, bother to make these confounded promises in the first place. Because tradition binds them into doing it? Because it serves to forebear one for more broken promises and crushed resolutions in the coming year? Or because it gives the tiniest syllable of hope that things can be different, that we have the power to make it so?
Writing this post, I've come to realise, a little late though I may be, that making a change in your life, whether its losing a couple of inches of your waist or changing careers, requires more than a written expression of that wish or even an earnest desire to change. It requires steely determination and a long-term commitment. Which is why my belated new years resolution is not a renewal of my old ones but a pledge to practice some discipline and acquire some self-respect. Then, and only then will I consider renewing my old resolutions.