Every year we make ’em. Every year we break ’em. Why do we keep doing this? New Years’ resolutions.

Yes, from one angle, they can be a list of goals we expect to not reach. That weight we can’t lose. That instrument we can’t seem to learn. That trip we can never seem to take.

Sure, resolutions can be downers, if we let them.

But we need them- and here’s why.

Resolutions help us to think about the big picture of our life. They drive us to ask ourselves “What am I living for?” Every New Years, when the question of resolutions comes up, I am left to pause and think about how I am living. Am I really chasing the things that make me alive? Our resolutions usually relate to activities or endeavors that are important to our heart- that part of us that fills us up and makes us more alive. Making resolutions help us to be reminded of, and to keep first things first in our lives. We resolve to change those things that are most important to us in being able to live a rich life.

Resolutions also help us to test ourselves and our mettle. Buried in that long word “resolution” is the verb “resolve”. Anytime we choose to make a resolution, we are choosing to test our ability to stick to a plan. We are choosing to exercise our fortitude, and developing perseverance builds character in a big way. Making and keeping resolutions are character building, which is another way to say “They make you a better person. A better human being.” Setting and achieving goals is responsible human behavior, practiced by responsible people. Responsible living is a mark of being mature, and living resolutely is a big part of living responsibility.

Perhaps, most importantly, resolutions remind us we have the power to change. You and I can change our lives. We do not have to stay the same and live the same day over and over, like in the movie Groundhog Day. When we make resolutions, we, in the parlance of the old Love Boat theme song, “set a course for adventure, our sights on a new romance.” We aim ourselves at change, moving ourselves away from what has become stale, worn, or even destructive in our lives, wanting instead to grow, to discover new opportunities, to replace old habits with the new. We resolve to change something in our life, because we want to change the quality our life overall. A resolution is a statement of revolution and reformation in your life. You are declaring you want to keep growing and developing as a person. Sometimes, merely getting yourself to the place where you will aim at a new goal is half the battle to reaching your goal. You have to know where you want to go to be able to get there. Many of us can get stuck in the syndrome of thinking our life just is as it is, and we’re stuck in it. Not true. You and I can change our lives, one step, one behavior at a time. We are not stuck in our lives.

So don’t overlook or omit your New Years resolutions this year. Take on the challenge of changing yourself, of grabbing the reins in your life and permitting yourself to head out toward new frontiers. You may make some resolutions and not meet them. You may fail reaching your goals miserably. But you will be changed. The work you put in toward reaching that goal will benefit you anyhoo. Your goals will help you to become different, will help you to see your life in perspective, and will nudge you along the way of becoming a stronger person.

In this world of constant change, living reactively, sliding schedules, Twitter-trending, and relative thinking, making and trying to keep resolutions will also allow you to develop something within yourself that many other people do not nurture. Something that is needed in people and organizations in this world. Something that is under-valued but humanly necessary for every effort and for every success achieved in life.

You will develop your resolve.

So, make it short and sweet- but get cracking on that list.