5 New Year's resolutions for men in 2023.

Good ol’ New Years. It’s a time for epic parties and silly fun. It’s also a moment when we tend to reflect a little extra.

How was your 2022? Did you meet your goals? Fall short in some ways? Do you feel more positive or negative about it?

Obviously, everyone has a different answer, but our hope is that you had more good in the year than bad. Either way, 2023 is a new year with new opportunities.

And in that line of thinking, we’re going to talk to you about resolutions. They’re a great way to hit the year with motivation to make a positive change, but a lot of times, they don’t work out. So, we’re going to suggest five resolutions that can really make a profound difference in your life, and you might find that they’re more approachable and attainable than a lot of other resolutions.

1. Pursue mindfulness

We’re starting off a little serious, aren’t we? Well, these are supposed to be legitimate resolutions.

So, how do you go about mindfulness? What’s the point? What’s it all about?

In general, mindfulness is trying to be more aware of yourself, your environment,the people around you, how they feel, and how your decisions, actions, and words impact them. It’s improving your awareness.

Some might say that empathy is the key. Empathy is certainly a part of mindfulness, but there’s a lot more going on here.

After all, if you’re really honest with yourself, you are a person who feels deeply. You’re plenty capable of powerful empathy; it’s not something you really need to practice.

Really, mindfulness is about doing things on purpose. Use your empathy to think about the people around you. Use that to come to a decision about what you should say or how you should behave. That’s what mindfulness is really about—informing your decisions after careful consideration.

Now, how do we make this into a useful resolution?

It’s simple. Designate time in your day for mindfulness. It can be just 10 minutes where you stop and focus on your breath or on the way your feet feel on the ground. The whole point is that you can stop doing other activities and be in the moment. You can even do it as a meditative practice if you want.

If you make it routine, you’ll think about it more, and all of your relationships (including your relationship with yourself) will benefit.

2. Get more holistic about health

You know you need to eat healthy foods and exercise regularly. We all know that. Most of us struggle with it at least a little bit.

That is not the end of health considerations.

By all means, continue making strides in terms of diet and exercise, but maybe this year, you can think about health in a different way. Maybe, you’re ready for a holistic approach to your own health.

What does that really mean, though?

Mostly, it means that you should pay as much attention to your mental, social, and spiritual health as you do to your physical health. These things are all intertwined, and when you do a little better in one area, it usually helps you do better in all areas.

Let’s consider exercise, which is probably what most of us understand best.

When you exercise regularly, you have more energy, feel more alert, are a little smarter, and typically, these feelings help with mental and spiritual health. When you feel better physically, you often feel better about yourself. It’s a nice little feedback loop.

But, it works in all directions, and that’s what holistic health is all about. When you spend time on mindfulness every day, it can help your mental health. That, in turn, can make it just a little easier to keep up with your diet and exercise.

We can go in these circles forever, or we can give you some resources to really help you consider holistic health and learn about this broader approach to well-being.

One second, though. Where’s the resolution?

Browse the resources, and commit to one change in the name of holistic health. That should be enough to get you into the positive feedback loop, and the rest will follow naturally.

3. Give

We’re taking a bit of a journey today, aren’t we?

In the interest of keeping things from going too far down any rabbit holes, here’s a really easy New Year’s resolution. Give.

Ok, admittedly, that’s a generic thing to say, but bear with us for a moment.

When you give, out of true generosity, it’s good for you. It might mean donating money to a good cause, but honestly, that’s the lamest way to go about this. No, we’re not knocking charitable donations. They really are important.

But if you give of your time and energy, it’s usually a lot more rewarding. By all means, give some money to your local food shelter, but maybe consider a weekend a month with Habitat for Humanity. (Obviously, these are random causes. You can pick whatever speaks to you). 

This is by far the simplest, most powerful resolution out there. Give a little bit of time and energy to a cause you believe in, and you’ll feel great about it. That’s really all there is to it.

4. Invest in self-care

While it’s great to give to others, you can also give to yourself a little.

When it comes to self-care, everyone has their own thoughts. We’re not here to dictate anything to you. If you have ideas for self-care, run with them.

If you happen to be struggling, though, then we have a few suggestions that can go a long way.

First, do something simple that physically makes you feel better. In our expert opinions, grooming some body hair can do this. It takes a small amount of time, and afterward, you feel fresh and clean. And, you might have less body hair that tugs on you.

You can grab The Lawn Mower® 4.0, and you can easily remove body hair that might annoy you. It’s a small thing that feels great. This small, positive thing can reverberate out into the universe, begetting more positive events.

In that same vein, you can also do something that makes you feel a little better about yourself. A new outfit that makes you look nice goes a long way. A sharp haircut, dying the gray in your beard, or even a change of deodorant can all make a subtle but real impact on your self-image.

So, invest in a practice or change that makes you feel good about yourself. We’re pretty heavily invested in this whole thing, so feel free to browse our library for ideas. Start small. Go big. It’s all up to you.

5. Invest in self-worth

Self-care is about making physical changes. Investing in your sense of self-worth is about internal changes.

This is a broad idea, so we’re going to use a specific example to paint a picture. You don’t need to pick this exact resolution. The idea is to steer into your personal values.

Here’s an idea for a resolution. Build yourself a new desk. 

It’s pretty simple, right? But, in order to do that, you might have to learn some new skills. Or, if you’re already decent at carpentry, you should challenge yourself to build a very custom, elaborate desk. Take on some new challenges; that’s really at the heart of this whole idea.

Building your desk will do a few things for you. First, it will force you to learn and get out of your comfort zone. That’s a good thing. Also, it will leave you with a sense of accomplishment. You’re going to esteem yourself more highly because you have proof of your accomplishment every time you use the desk.

Now, to get away from this overly specific example, there are countless things you can learn, and even more projects that you can use as an avenue for learning. Replace a car engine, have a conversation with a native in another language, take a painting class. You get the idea. Choose something that you think makes you a better (or more valuable) person in some way, and go for it.

6. Bonus: Cut yourself some slack

We promised five resolutions. Here’s your bonus idea. 

We made this section for it because this is harder to frame in a concise resolution.

Anyway, here it goes. Cut yourself some slack.

Resolutions are all about renewing yourself and being better, and that’s an important thing to do. None of us is perfect. There’s always room for improvement, but that fact is a two-edged sword.

No matter how hard you try, there’s always more room for improvement. So, maybe you don’t need to always hold yourself to such a high standard all the time. Maybe, it’s ok to acknowledge that putting effort into one area of your life usually comes at the cost of another area of your life.

If you admit that you can’t actually do it all, and you can’t be better than everyone in every way, then you can move toward a little acceptance. You don’t need to live behind excuses, but you can cut yourself some slack.

If you make a decision to do something specific with your time and energy, it really is ok that you aren’t using those resources to do other things. If meditating every day means that you leave a few dirty dishes in the sink, maybe that’s just fine. Pick your battles, and try to forgive yourself for having limitations. You’re doing just fine. We promise.