• “Write it on your heart that every day is the best day in the year.” -Ralph Waldo Emerson
• “New Year’s Day: Now is the accepted time to make your regular annual good resolutions. Next week you can begin paving hell with them as usual.” -Mark Twain
• “Time has no divisions to mark its passage, there is never a thunder-storm or blare of trumpets to announce the beginning of a new month or year. Even when a new century begins it is only we mortals who ring bells and fire off pistols.” -Thomas Mann
• “New Year’s is a harmless annual institution, of no particular use to anybody save as a scapegoat for promiscuous drunks, and friendly calls and humbug resolutions.” -Mark Twain
• “Year’s end is neither an end nor a beginning but a going on, with all the wisdom that experience can instill in us.” -Hal Borland
• “Celebrate each new day, and be grateful for every moment of this wonderful life. Happy New Day!” -yours truly

It’s that time of the year again – the happy new year wishes, fireworks, cheer, and most importantly, the optimism for the year ahead.

How about greeting each new day with the same cheer and optimism. Isn’t waking up each morning a reason to be grateful and happy? Isn’t every day a chance to celebrate life and everything it has to offer? If that seems a bit too extreme, then how about ‘happy new week’? Could we not be as excited about the challenges and surprises that each new week brings?

This year try new month resolutions at the start of every new month. I’ve tried and it works much better than new year resolutions.

Two related posts about the New Year: You DON’T need New Year resolutions! and Make it happen in 2013 – without any New Year resolutions!

[Photo of sunrise during an African Safari – December 2011]