Caribbean Travel and Leisure Magazine

New Year's Resolutions. Research over the years has concluded that about 80% of all New Year's Resolutions are broken by January 31. If that resolution had something to do with health and fitness (working out, losing weight, quitting smoking, etc), 90% will be history by January 15th!! Some people choose to approach this annual ritual with a degree of triviality and playfulness. So for those who prefer "Resolutions Lite", I've got some great suggestions later in this article. Why New Year's Resolutions Fail

Simply put, if our lives and actions were conducive to producing a particular result, we would probably produce it, especially if it was important to us. Our brains are wired in such a way that certain behaviors keep repeating themselves, which in turn produces results that are consistent with those behaviors. Let's face it, if you hate working out at the gym, then buying a three-year contract at your local fitness center in hopes that it will somehow shame you into working off that beer gut is nuts! The starting point to being successful at ANYTHING in life, including resolutions, is your expectations. Expectations cause two things to happen. First, they stimulate actions that are consistent with the expectation. Outcomes are then produced which are consistent with those actions. And second, expectations inspire a particular quality of conversations. The surrounding environment (friends, family, co-workers, acquaintances, etc.) begins to respond to those conversations, and that environment takes actions and produces outcomes that are consistent with those conversations.

For example, if you are confident that you can replace the leaky faucet in the bathroom, even though you've never done it before, your attitude will be positive and your actions will have a quality about them that produces results. You're likely to stick with those actions long enough, and learn what you need to learn, to get those results. Substitute the example of "fixing the faucet" with "losing weight", saving money", "writing a book", "falling in love"... well, you get the picture. The expectation itself will be a dominant force in determining the outcome.

And that's what makes New Year's Resolutions so vexing for most of us.

The Royal Caribbean ship the Sovereign of the Seas was recently written up with fairly favorable reviews. The ship's cinema was also fitted with a small screen, and the seating was limited. Activities are well-represented with art auctions, Broadway shows, casinos, and comedy clubs. A Caribbean cruise that ended up in the Bahamas had its first stop at Royal Caribbean's private island, CocoCay. You could take excursions to the island from the ship, reaching the island from the ship's anchoring point by way of small boats called tenders. A Royal Caribbean cruise review telling about a Bahamas cruise is not complete without information about the stop in Nassau. The cruise line discouraged people from taking local tours, but some of the local tours were worth taking. Read a Royal Caribbean cruise review or more if you are interested in taking this cruise