Be It Resolved

It’s a new year, so it might be time to start anew.

Mutts cartoon for January 1, 2022

We hear a lot about resolutions this time of year, and we may think we understand that word—without thinking much about it. So let’s take this time for a somewhat deep dive into the meaning.

Re-  is a prefix meaning again.

Solve is a word that comes from the idea of loosening, releasing, or freeing. You can see that in “dissolve.” In noun form, a solution can be a mixture of separate things, such as salt in water—a saline solution. Chemically, the salt and the water do not change, but they combine fairly well in solution.

But another way of thinking of the verb solve is to “find a satisfactory answer or explanation.” You can solve a crime by figuring out who-done-it, or how the crime was done. You can solve a puzzle by figuring out the right answer, or the right way to get the desired outcome.

from Webster's New World Dictionary, 2nd College Edition, (c) 1982

So resolve might be to get the right answer again.

But we tend to think of it as “reaching a decision or intention,” and resolution as determining or deciding upon a future action.

In the adjective form, to be resolute is to show unwavering determination. 

Resolute  is the name of the historic desk in the Oval Office, given to President Rutherford B. Hayes in 1880, a gift from Queen Victoria. It was built from the oak timbers of the British Arctic exploration ship HMS Resolute.

Pres. John F. Kennedy giving a TV address from the Resolute Desk
Getty image, found here

A decade or so ago I stopped writing down goals as New Year’s resolutions, and chose a word (or sometimes a two-word phrase) for the year. One year it actually was resolute. Other years it has been healing, resilience, and fruition. In 2020, ahead of knowing what was coming, my word/phrase was “hold on,” which turned out to be very appropriate. I think about my yearly word for a good long time, and let it come to me, hopefully as inspiration, from the Source of inspiration. So I am resolute to focus on that word and see where it takes me during the year. Sometimes I’m slow, and it takes into February to decide. This year I’m early. Maybe another time I’ll let you know what this year’s was and how that played out.

I do like looking at the inspirational ideas and quotes that come up at this renewal, resolution time. So I’ll share a few of those today.

I found this last year and made it into a meme to share.

A couple of days ago I read a piece in The Imaginative Conservative by John Horvat on how to deal with “not normal” times, such as 2020 to present. His advice: improvise and dare. He explains: 

To better understand what this entails, we might recall a story about Churchill during World War II. A particular commander in a difficult fight with the Germans asked for instructions. Churchill sent an order with three words: “Improvise and dare!” The commander followed his advice, and Churchill, in a flourish of grammatical audacity, wrote that he “improvose and dore.”

In short, rather than visualizing a particular outcome, we need to be flexible, so we can be ready for anything. The challenge is doing this when you’ve already been through a couple of years with all your resources stretched to the breaking point. So, maybe at this top of the year, do an assessment of your resources—of the things that you can be resourceful with, such as your good humor, your resilience, your positive attitude, and maybe even your ability to cook from scratch or do your own plumbing (what we’re doing here in the Spherical Model household as I write this).

Horvat adds,

Improvise does not mean winging it, doing things unprepared or without study. We must take all necessary precautions. We learn to work with God’s grace to inspire us. When the time comes to act, we know things can change quickly and are ready to adjust accordingly.

He goes on to talk about daring, but I’ll let you read that.

If you’re serious—resolute—about making your life better, you might go ahead and read Jordan Peterson’s 12 Rules for Life, and follow that up with his latest book, Beyond Order: 12 More Rules for Life.

He has been talking about these books and their concepts in a number of videos. A few days ago there was a compilation listed as “A Guide to Fixing Your Life in 2022 (how to change your life this year).” There’s so much in there that can be put into practical application.

In another video, he talks with Dr. Christopher Kaczor and Dr. Matthew Petrusek about their book, which includes his name in the title: Jordan Peterson, God, and Christianity. The two are from a Catholic organization called Word on Fire. The conversation was not confrontational, but a deep and thoughtful exploration of God and meaning and how to live a good life.

Dr. Kaczor tells this incident that was related to him. His friend went to a lecture on God’s existence, and after the lecture this friend went up to the lecturer and challenged him:

After the lecture my friend came up to him and said, “You know, everything you say is a bunch of malarkey. There’s no God. It’s just—your lecture is just meaningless.” And the guy said, “OK, what I want you to do is, for the next week, I want you to treat everyone that you meet as if they were Jesus in disguise.”

And the guy left the lecture, and he went home. And, you know, he gets home and Mom’s there doing the dishes, and he thought to himself, well, if this were Jesus in disguise doing the dishes, I’d probably go up and, like, help my mom do the dishes.

And then Dad came home from work, and rather than ignore him, he said, “Hey, Dad, how was work? How’s everything going?” And, you know, because, if that were really Jesus in disguise, I would do that.

And then they were eating dinner together with the family, and there’s one hamburger left. And he turns to his brother and says, “Hey, why don’t you have this?”

And the guy told me, his life was completely transformed by literally one week of acting in this sort of way.

Might be an experiment worth trying.

One thing that experiment required was a relatively good understanding of how to behave toward Jesus—or maybe how to behave if you’re trying to emulate Jesus, which is another way to look at it: what would Jesus do? So, for that, you need to have either a terrific imagination or some grounding in the scriptures.

Reading more scriptures is a not uncommon New Year’s resolution. I actually do read scriptures every day. I’ve done that for decades, rarely missing. But if that's not you, I don’t think it’s a good idea to set a resolution to read every single day this year—because then, if you miss a day in January, it messes up your goal for the full year. Better to resolve to set up a pattern in your life that will allow for more scripture reading. If you get distracted in the morning by all the necessities of getting ready for the day, find a different time, or a different way. At times I’ve had my phone or tablet read aloud to me while I do my face and hair. Maybe it’s not that concentrated study time I’d like, or that I imagine I ought to demand of myself, but it adds up to significant time in the scriptures. 

If just before bed is bad for you, because you fall asleep before you get to it, then find another time. Set your scriptures where you can reach them at some point every day. Maybe have them on your phone to replace some of that scrolling time.

If last year you were only reading maybe half of the days, or less, then 4 or 5 days a week would be an improvement, even if you were aiming at 7 days a week. Celebrate your improvement, rather than berating yourself for not having a perfect record. That sort of “better batting average” approach might motivate you more than perfection resolutions. Worth a try.

Related to that, here’s a quote from the president and prophet of my church:

Keep studying the scriptures, keep doing the things that build your faith in Jesus Christ and then notice the wise choices you are naturally drawn to make.—Pres. Russell M. Nelson

 

As I send you my best wishes as you go out there and take on 2022, here are a few more thoughts about this time for resolution and resoluteness:

 

When obstacles arise, you change your direction to reach your goal; you do not change your decision to get there.—Zig Ziglar

 

You can’t go back and change the beginning, but you can start where you are and change the ending.—C. S. Lewis

 

The great task of life is to learn the will of the Lord and then do it.

—Ezra Taft Benson

 

Prayer is a key. Pray to know what to stop doing and what to start doing. Pray to know what to add to your environment and what to remove so the Spirit can be with you in abundance.

Plead with the Lord for the gift of discernment. Then live and work to be worthy to receive that gift so that when confusing events arise in the world, you will know exactly what is true and what is not.

Serve with love. Loving service to those who have lost their way or who are wounded in spirit opens your heart to personal revelation.

Spend more time—much more time—in places where the Spirit is present. That means more time with friends who are seeking to have the Spirit with them. Spend more time on your knees in prayer, more time in the scriptures, more time in family history work, more time in the temple. I promise you that as you consistently give the Lord a generous portion of your time, He will multiply the remainder.—Pres. Russell M. Nelson 

 

"Practice doesn't make perfect. Practice reduces the imperfection."—Toba Beta

 

“The Christian does not think God will love us because we are good, but that God will make us good because He loves us.”—C. S. Lewis