Right about now, you may be feeling that urge, which hits sometime during the first couple of months of every year, the urge to forget the New Year’s resolutions to which you had so daringly committed only weeks ago. After all, you’ve already eaten that cake, skipped that workout session, smoked that cigarette… whatever. You tried, you failed.

But if the resolution was a good idea to start with—good enough for you to resolve to do it in the first place—then it’s probably still a good idea now. And giving up on resolutions, it seems to me, may be the sign of an addiction.

What do I mean by that? I’m glad you asked.

On the other hand, the new year is one of those months, one of those weeks, one of those days of the year. So New Year’s is as good a time as any to make a resolution… and keep it.

Here’s the resolution I’ve made for myself this new year. Actually, I started it December 31, because that’s when I decided to make the resolution. If I had decided to make this resolution in October, I would have started doing it in October. Because if something is worth doing, it’s worth doing now. There’s no point in waiting until January 1 to start improving your life. And that is why I’m here at my computer, working on the holiday, rather than playing Wii. Because that’s one of the steps to keeping a New Year’s resolution.