A New Year is Coming; Time to Hate Yourself!

Calvin and Hobbes shaped the majority of my childhood.

Now that the holidays are coming to an end, and the New Year is fast approaching, the yearly onslaught is upon us. Every year, around this time, we are subjected to more and more ads telling us just how unhappy we are and promising that their products will make us complete and healthy members of society. I'm referring, of course, to the tradition of making New Year's Resolutions and the insane amounts of adverts aimed at subtly nudging us into making them by promising to help us actually keep them.

While spending less money, eating better, exercising more, and falling in love (because deciding you're going to fall in love with someone at some point in the next 365 days is a super healthy goal, and not at all one of the fastest ways to prematurely jump into a bad relationship) were among the Top 10 list of resolutions, according to a study by the University of Scranton on Statistics Brain, the #1 New Year's Resolution for 2014 was to lose weight. That's about as disheartening as it is unsurprising. We have been conditioned to hate ourselves, and that is super sad. Here's the thing: You wanna be more healthy? Great! Be more healthy. There, done. You don't need the pressure of media and adverts to make you hate yourself as motivation to change how you look. No one needs that. It's not inspirational, it's cruel. If you really feel like you need to make a New Year's Resolution, resolve to learn to love yourself for who you are, to be more kind, donate more of your time to those in need, to learn something new, or to simply be more thankful for what you have instead of focusing on what you want. This may all sound like a bit of New Age, hippy, after-school special rubbish, but I'm of the opinion that if you're going to bother to make resolutions then you may as well make them count. Personally, I don't think you need to make any resolutions. You can certainly chose to change something about yourself that you're not 100% proud of, but you can do that at any time of year. So, despite all the adverts subtly telling you all of the ways you're not perfect, and how much you should change to meet the standards of other people you'll likely never meet, I leave you with one of the greatest memes ever created. Any time you begin to feel down about yourself, take a look at this fantastic piece of motivational support, crack a smile, and go on about your day, you brilliant, sexy beast, you!

Super Great