Most Broken New Year's Resolution

Twelve promises made on the first of January, and the bracket is not asking which is most worthwhile. It is asking which one dies fastest. There is real data behind the joke. Gym memberships spike in January and attendance collapses by the second week of February, which is consistent enough that the industry prices around it. The resolutions that survive tend to be specific and small; the ones that fail tend to be identity claims dressed as goals. Read more books fails because it has no definition of success. Go to the gym fails because it requires a version of you that does not exist yet to show up on a Tuesday in the rain.

The full field is thirty-two resolutions, and voting for one is not an accusation. Most people are choosing from experience rather than observation.

Quit smoking sits awkwardly in this field and it is worth flagging. It is the hardest thing on the list by a considerable margin and also the one where failure matters most, which makes it a strange thing to laugh at alongside the others.