The new year is barely underway and, as every new year before it, I am motivated toward new goals and look to things I hope to accomplish in 2020.

It is definitely cliché, but the new year offers the perfect break point to reset and kick new habits into gear. I know I am personally using the arbitrary date as a chance to finally kick my destructive fast food habit. So far, this has been going pretty well, and I haven’t caved to Taco Bell even once. Keep in mind, at the time of writing this, it’s been less than a week since the New Year.

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Something that often goes with eating better is working out. Toward the end of 2019, I definitely fell off the ball in terms of running. In 2020 I have already begun going on regular runs again. I don’t expect to run a marathon any time soon, but it definitely feels good to know I am doing my best to be a little more active.

In addition to the running and eating less fast food, I decided to give Dry January a try. With the amount of drinking prevalent around the holidays, I decided a month off didn’t sound like such a bad idea.

Moving away from personal goals and resolutions, the new year also represents a great point to take a step back and look at professional achievements. This year I plan on working on more in-depth stories for my coverage on Global Traveler, trazeetravel.com and whereverfamily.com. I also am making a concerted effort to attend more events throughout the year, starting with Philadelphia International Airport’s Media Day, which happened earlier this week.

The new year is certainly an arbitrary time to pick up new goals. Gyms are always packed, running courses are full, and salad bars seem to be filled by people looking to make a healthy change. This year, let’s all try to keep our resolutions and make for a healthy change.

— Erich Martin, assistant editor