I’ll Do It Next Year
by L.D. Kirklin
As 2025 started winding down, and the start of this new year approached, I began hearing buzz from friends and reading posts about what people planned to do when the new year arrived. It didn’t surprise me that eating better and getting more exercise were at the top of many lists. While a healthier 2026 was a common theme, some of the other ideas and resolutions for the new year were different. Some people stated their intentions to…
… visit with family and friends more often
… worry less about what other people think
… be more generous
… be more understanding
… volunteer more
… get things organized
I must admit, the list of commitments for the new year had plenty of noteworthy variety, but there was one declaration that grabbed my attention more than the others:
In the new year, I am going to stop putting things off.
Now, as one who tends to dabble in procrastination, I could relate to the need for this resolution. However, as one who is well versed in irony, I couldn’t help but chuckle at the paradox. With more than a week until the new year dawned, this person, in all sincerity, was putting off plans to stop procrastinating. I don’t know about you, but I found some head shaking humor in that.
Of course, once the laughing and head shaking ceased, I began to ponder what it is about a pending new year that inspires many of us to make plans to change something about ourselves. Whether we want to join a gym, write a book, or find a different hobby, January 1st seems to be the facilitator of transformation.
So, why do so many of us seem to think that a new year will help us do something we are not willing to do right now? Do we need a week to strategize? Do we need a couple of weeks to get used to the idea? Or are we just trying to convince ourselves to change something that we know we never will? I mean let’s face it, new habits are not easy to form.
I recently saw a commercial where a man was going around telling his friends and coworkers that he was going to remodel his kitchen. He gave specific details about the arrangement of the space and mentioned the colors of paint he was considering. At first everyone seemed interested in his plans, but all he did was talk about the same details. Several people could even recite the details with him as he talked but did nothing. He would tell people, “This is the year we remodel the kitchen” and start into the same story. He kept putting off his project, rendering his words worthless.
As I thought about the idea of putting things off, I remembered a story about my aunt Mary Etta who despised doing dishes. As one in a family of fourteen, you can likely only imagine how many dishes there were to wash at the end of a meal. Each evening, one of the seven girls in the family was tasked with washing the dishes. I’m not sure how the other six girls approached the task, but when it was Aunt Mary Etta’s turn, she avoided it with a sheer stubbornness that almost made the task disappear…almost.
Apparently, as my aunt found every reason she could to avoid washing the dishes, one of her younger brothers would show up at every turn, taunting her about her looming dishwashing project. “Mary Etta … wash the dishes!” His singsong tease was a constant and annoying reminder that she couldn’t avoid the task forever.
The truth is a new year doesn’t change the fact that we all have dishes to wash. The question is, how much of the new year are we going to waste avoiding those dishes? How many of this year’s 525,600 minutes will we spend talking about the things we need to do while putting them off? My sincere hope is that we do not misuse or take for granted one single minute of this gift called life!
So, as the newness of this year wears off and becomes a normal routine, let’s do our best to remember that we don’t need to wait for a momentous or notable occasion to start doing the things that need done. Let’s remodel our kitchens, wash our dishes, and pave our paths with good results instead of good intentions. After all, if we are blessed with them, each new year has 365 new days that we can use to put our words into action.
Never underestimate the power of perspective!
ldkirklin.com
