The New Year’s resolution is dead and replaced by the ‘ins and outs’ list

polygon.com:

The New Year’s resolution is out. Typing up detailed lists in a notes app is in.

Instead of opting for traditional New Year’s resolutions, people on platforms like TikTok and Instagram are making lists of what they want to embrace or leave behind in the upcoming year and calling them “ins and outs” lists. The trending videos can take the form of written text on a video or a screenshot from a notes app. The range of what can be “in” and what can be “out” seems to have no limits. Anything from new habits, like “being on time,” to more abstract values, like “taking care of my inner child,” can be in for 2024.

What can or cannot be “in” or “out” seemingly has no constraint — it’s a massive trend where people add whatever they want. That said, many of the videos embody a certain “soft girl” or “gentle living” aesthetic or ethos. Videos are often set to a gentle piano and items on the “ins” lists seem to lean into counterculture or anti-consumerist values and embody an ethic of deinfluencing. Rather than listing any specific product recommendations like skin care or trendy clothing, TikTokers are pushing back against consumption and listing “fast fashion” in the out section.

Trends like this leave a mixed taste in my mouth. On one hand, the lists seem like a very “online” trend that takes something very personal, like your mindset for approaching the new year, and turns it into content. In this sense, TikTok effectively commodifies a list of personal goals and turns it into yet another consumable piece of content that can reap as many as one million views and 170,000 likes.

#greenscreen here is my 2024 IN/OUT list

And while these lists don’t focus on specific product recommendations, they still are trying to “sell” you on