While this week is the final time of the year to get everything ready to go for Christmas, a week from now a lot of people will be doing another type of finalizing — New Year's resolutions.
Seems like every year is the same when it comes to these resolutions they're mostly the same; lose weight, be a better person, travel to a bucket list destination, andread more books. But how did it all begin? Did someone just wake up one particular Dec. 31 and say they were going to start something new the next day and it just caught on with the rest of the world?
Well, just like a lot of things, New Year's resolutions can be traced back thousands of years ago.
Thanks to The History Channel (partially owned by Hearst, the parent company of this publication) we now know that resolutions to bring in the new year date all the way back to the ancient Babylonians. And every new year (which was in March) a new king would be crowned or loyalty would be renewedonce more to the current king. Additionally, there would be promises made to the gods to pay all debts and return borrowed items — all with the hope that the gods (pagan gods to be precise) would reward the promise keepers in the new year.
A famous man you may have heard about by the name of Julius Caesar made January 1 the start of the new year in ancient Rome. He also named the month after the Greek god Janus; a two-headed god that looked both forward and backward. Giving the belief that he looked back into the past and forward to the future.
With 2024 rapidly approaching, Forbes reports the top five common resolutions are:
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