|PIC1|If someone else tells me that they’ve broken their New Year’s resolutions already, I think I’ll throttle them. It’s only January the 8th!

Not exactly the kind of talk you’d expect from the head of the Bible Society, but you get my point.

Why make these silly resolutions in the first place if you’re not going to keep them? And what’s the point of saying you’ll stop kicking the cat if you don’t mean it?

It’s just a waste of time.

Here are some of the more unrealistic resolutions I’ve heard:

Stick to one pint at the pub after work
Get to bed by 10.30 pm and not stay up for Question Time
Put the seat down in the bathroom
Exercise
Buy flowers for my spouse
Be less grumpy

None of these are bad in themselves. On the contrary, they get my vote as they’d all make the world a better place.

It’s the way that we think that our resolve, or will, is strong enough to make them a reality. Pulling off a lasting change in behaviour is a lot harder than we think. That’s why we fail at it.

Creating habits takes up to three months to take effect. That’s ninety days of concentration and practice before they become second nature.

Take cleaning your teeth for example. Having done it all our life means that it would be harder not to do it in the mornings than to head for the bathroom and squeeze out the tube.

Other habits are the same. At first they seem strange and a bit false. Others may even resist or resent our changed behaviour. Our husband or wife might not like cooking for us and eating healthy food, or seeing us go running every other evening. They may not want a ‘new you’, however much they campaigned for change in the first place.

Odd that. But resolutions are funny things and there are two sides to making them stick.

First is the habit built up over the ninety days between today and April 8th. You’ll want the support of family and friends to do this. Then comes the reflection that’s needed to see what makes it so hard to change our own particular behaviour.

Times of quiet reflection over the next three months are essential if we’re going to make changes that stick.

Habits and reflection. It’s what the self-help books often don’t tell you. But if we want lasting change then it’s what our resolutions should be about.