Why do we do it?

The new year is just over a week old and already many, well intended, resolutions have fallen by the wayside as life (time) trundles on regardless. One of the greatest benefits of living in the free world is the ability to make choices. As an individual I am empowered to cast my vote in elections and referendums; where I put my cross is a decision that I am allowed to make - there are no penalties should I choose a different box from you! This past Christmas holiday was brought into stark focus by a comment from a guy I work with. We were in the changing room, at shift changeover, and as he bid me farewell on his final day of the year. His parting shot was "It's a bloody lot of fuss for just another roast dinner!" Bordering on genius - he summed up everything I feel about this over-hyped festival of consumerism. Of course I enjoyed my time away from work, Bev and I actually saw in the New year for the first time in ages, but I am loathe to change simply due to the ticking of a clock. The life choices I've made, those that have gotten me to where I am presently, can't have been too bad, so why bother tweaking them on New Year's Day? I don't need a doctor to tell me I drink too much, I'm a grown man, well able to make up my own mind about this and myriad other subjects (although Bev sometimes chucks her two-penneth in for good measure)
And yet, still, we all view the start of the new year as a fresh dawn, the beginning of the rest of our lives? I have made, very public, my plans to seek three new PB's during 2017, others have also set their stalls out in a blaze of blogging enthusiasm. But do any of us really mean it? Are we really that committed to major life changes or long term plans, especially as the majority of blogs I visit, regularly, are written by folk of a very similar vintage to myself. Plans, strategies, pie charts and standard deviations all play a role in my working environment, the real world, the one in which I am free to make choices, is a totally different concept. That I, and the vast majority of the bloggers I am enthused by, use the limitless and under-explored wonders of the natural world to find escape from the mundane, is why so many of our resolutions are folly. Nature refuses to conform with our expectations, it acts independently, a slave to the vagueries of climate and constant environmental change.
I think it would have been much easier, and far closer to the truth, if we all stated that what we really want is to continue to derive pleasure (however gained) from the simple experience of being outdoors and interacting with nature.