The occasional struggle to gasp for a breath of fresh air motivated Tim Kelly to trash his Marlboro cigarettes in an attempt to start off the New Year right.

As a New Year’s resolution, Kelly, a junior in elementary education from Rockford, decided to end a five-year smoking habit to improve his health and become a better person.

It’s tough at times, Kelly said. There were times when I would lose my breath, and then there’s been a lot of talk of cancer and emphysema, too.

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Quitting smoking, losing weight and maintaining decent grades are among the most common traditional New Year’s resolutions that students vow to keep this year.

According to www.newyearresolution.com, the Romans began making New Year’s resolutions as early as 153 B.C. when January, named after the ancient Roman diety Janus, became the first month of the year. With two faces, Janus looked back on the preceding year while looking forward to the coming year. To the Romans, he encouraged making peace with enemies and giving gifts to friends as a way to start the New Year.

Becoming smoke-free is challenging for Kelly, who regularly smoked a pack of cigarettes a day and continues to be surrounded by a circle of tobacco-toting friends.

I’ve tried to quit before, but it’s hard because a lot of people around me smoke, he said. I don’t think it will be a problem though. I just have to get away from it.

Joe Baker, the environmental health and safety coordinator for Student Health Programs, said Kelly’s effort to stop smoking is popular each New Year, but the end result may not live up to expectations.

To stop smoking is the No. 1 New Year’s resolution, Baker said. And we all know that New Year’s resolutions are more easily made than kept.

For seven years, Baker has aided area smokers as the coordinator of the campus-based Kick Those Butts program. He said maintaining a resolution to stop smoking is more successful when done with group support.

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Motivation is the key factor, he said. There are better results when people are placed in groups because they support each other in the process.

Crystal Bobbitt, a senior in finance from Albion, does not need support keeping her resolutions this year. She no longer makes any. Traditionally, Bobbitt resolves to lose weight each year by exercising at the Student Recreation Center three times a week. By April, she scrapped the resolution.

It was very time-consuming, and I was too busy with work to think about it, she said. I ate too much and I still do, with burgers and fries and pizza. I neglect my body, and usually I like to feel better about myself.

Like Bobbitt, Jon Emery, an undecided sophomore from Lake of Egypt, disagrees with the concept of New Year’s resolutions. Setting a standard to live by for an entire year may be hopeless.

I figure that it’s best that you don’t make them because if you end up doing something good then you’ve accomplished something, Emery said. Then you have something to feel good about. But if you do make a resolution and don’t go through with it, then you’ve failed at something. So you just shouldn’t do it all.

But Mary Martin, owner of the Diet Center, 300 E. Main St., said people need resolutions to feel good about themselves. Each year she helps a number of people who have resolved to change their diet and appearance.

New habits are easily formed, she said. You are what you eat, obviously, and our vanity says we want to look good in what we wear. You have an air of confidence that says, Look I’ve accomplished something.’ With the New Year, the Diet Center nearly triples its enrollment with people who splurged over the holidays, and fell short on their attempt to lose weight on their own.

[The holidays] is the one time it is socially acceptable to eat, Martin said. Then they will try something on their own before coming to the center. It’s difficult to do, but it can be done.

Barbara Wright of Carterville experienced that difficulty while sticking to her resolution to lose 10 pounds. While working long days at University Mall’s Stock Room, she finds staying away from fatty food is an obstacle.

Last night it was so hectic, and this girl went and got cookies and candy, Wright said. And we ate it all. I couldn’t help it.

Barb Fijolek, Wellness Center coordinator, said it is never easy to follow through on a New Year’s resolution. After the year begins, the Wellness Center’s programs for nutrition, drugs and alcohol are occupied with people who have tried to change on their own.

It’s a psychological thing really, and you can stop whenever, Fijolek said. Just like seasons change, why not have a change the way you want.

While smoking and losing weight are concerns of most people who make New Year’s resolutions, Tenskaw Harding, an undecided junior from Chicago, opts to change his study habits to receive better grades this year.

In the past, [grades] just really didn’t matter to me, Harding said. Now my grades have slipped, and I’m going to study at least an hour a day.

Emery, who resolved to not to make resolutions, said he will not make unrealistic standards that may have little effect on his life.

It sets you up for a big let down, he said. I think everybody does it because it’s New Year’s, and you were drunk when you made it anyway.