New Year, New Me?

"New year, new me!" How many times did you or someone you know say those exact words at the start of a new year. There were probably good intentions behind it and maybe we really want to but how often do we actually change? 

Each year we tell ourselves that next year will be different. We're gonna finally lose weight, we're gonna do better in school, we're gonna really focus on God more, we're gonna do this and we're gonna do that. However, a lot of us end the year in the same place we started - not having made any progress towards bettering ourselves, growing as a person and accomplishing our goals and the cycle continues.  

But why? Why is it that, according to statistics, only 8% of us who make new year's resolutions are actually successful in keeping them? Is it that out goals are too big? Is it that we don't really try? Or maybe because we don't consider everything that it takes.

Anything worth having is worth making sacrifices for. Take professional athletes for example. To be able to make it to the Olympics is a great accomplishment and that's the part we see on the outside. What we don't see are the things they have to give up in order to reach their goal.

Whether it's losing weight or growing closer to God, we can't move forward if we're still holding onto old things. We have to actually let some things go.

Philippians 3:13 (NLT) says “No, dear brothers and sisters, I have not achieved it, but I focus on this one thing: Forgetting the past and looking forward to what lies ahead,”

Moving forward requires sacrifice. That means we have to really make up our minds to let go of old habits, old friends, old thoughts, old attitudes and old ways and leave them behind us 2016. Then we can really say "New year, new me" and mean it. 

#befabulous