Cliché Me Not: “New Year, New You”
A few days before New Year’s Eve, it started popping up in my inbox. . . then on pinterest, website ads, magazine articles and, even though we’re two weeks into the year, I STILL see it everywhere. The dreaded “New Year, New You”!
Yes, it seems that every marketer in the world can’t resist the call to make you anew. Skin care products, food companies, even my beloved spas, proclaim it’s a new year, let us give you a new you. Now if I were arguing a case before a judge and chided the witness “Why Mrs. Johnson, of course you’re not guilty of murder, because its a “New Year, New You!”, it would be stricken from the record as inflammatory.
Why do four little words get my goat in such a tizzy you ask? Well:
- I don’t want to be a new me
- It contains a built in excuse to fail
- Scientifically a new you takes longer than a year
- It’s so overplayed, it’s effectiveness is dubious
First, let’s look at the word “new”. By definition, new means not existing before. Hmm, so are they saying I don’t exist until I start on the road to a new me? And if that were the case, how would a non-existent me be able to change?
Of course, the phrase is meant to play to our New Years’ resolutions which come with in a built in fail of their own. That if we don’t begin our new habit on January 1st, or fail sometime soon thereafter, we’ve failed. New Year NOT New You, it’s an easy out.
Third, I once heard Deborah Szekely, founder of Rancho La Puerta Spa, speak. She claimed the body renews itself every seven years & the habits she cultivated in the past 7 years are why she is healthier now than she was at 83 (yes she’s 90!). Research confirms (thanks Stanford) that it takes 7 years for every single cell in your bod to be replaced.
That means that any habit begun, will take 7 years to fully manifest it’s benefit on us! Just think about that — once you start seeing the results on your skin, or figure of a new healthy habit, that’s just the tip of the iceberg — think how amazing it’s making your bones, blood and organs!
My last point is to marketers specifically. Considering how we’re so bombarded with this phrase, it’s easy to ignore and doesn’t create any desire (except to hurridly click away). Heck if how many times I’ve encountered it in the past month is any indication, even worse your messages will be lost.
So next year guys let’s hear something uh. . . new! Thanks.
