TL;DR: Instead of making major New Year’s resolutions that are hard to keep — especially with long, unpredictable first responder schedules — take a page from Benjamin Franklin’s playbook and focus on one small aspect of wellness at a time. Franklin improved himself by rotating through 13 virtues, and that same approach works for first responders: Pick one wellness “virtue” (like sleep, nutrition, movement, stress management, or boundaries), make small, realistic adjustments for a week, then move on to the next. Be sure to track your progress for accountability. Over time, these manageable changes add up to better health, greater resilience, and longer, more sustainable careers — without the burnout and guilt that come with all-or-nothing resolutions.
January 1 has a way of bringing out your inner optimist. This is the year you’ll eat clean, work out every day, get eight hours of sleep, and also somehow become immune to stress — all while working rotating 12-hour shifts in a profession fraught with stress and trauma.
Sound familiar?
New Year’s resolutions often come wrapped in big promises and absolutes: Never eat junk food again, train seven days a week, finally get everything in balance. And by mid-January, many of those resolutions are quietly forgotten, usually right around the third overtime shift in a row.
And of course, failing to keep your resolutions for the umpteenth year in a row adds yet another level of strain to an already compounding stress load.
For first responders, the problem often isn’t motivation — it’s reality. Long hours, unpredictable calls, disrupted sleep, and emotional trauma make sweeping lifestyle changes difficult to sustain.
New Year’s Day has already come and gone, so maybe you’ve already given up on resolution-based self-improvement. But here’s a different approach: Think smaller and smarter. Focus on one aspect of wellness at a time, make modest adjustments, and build momentum gradually. Small, consistent improvements beat ambitious plans that collapse under pressure and are difficult to maintain over the long term.
This idea isn’t new — and guess what? It comes from a person with deep roots in public safety history.
Benjamin Franklin is considered by many to be the “father of U.S. firefighting” for helping to organize one of America’s very first volunteer fire companies. He is also known for promoting fire prevention, preparedness, and civic responsibility. But Franklin was also deeply interested in personal discipline and self-improvement.
Importantly, Franklin was no monk. He openly enjoyed good food and good wine. (It was actually wine, not beer, that he famously called “a constant proof that God loves us, and loves to see us happy.”) A well-known womanizer, he openly embraced a wide range of very human vices.
Franklin’s journals and letters make it clear he was fully aware of his own shortcomings and indulgences — and he didn’t pretend otherwise. That is part of what makes him so relatable. Franklin wasn’t trying to become perfect; he was simply striving to become better than he was yesterday.
Rather than attempting to fix everything at once, Franklin created a structured approach to character development. As documented in his “Autobiography,” he identified 13 virtues and focused on one per week, rotating through them over time. He freely admitted he never mastered them all, but he believed the effort itself made him happier, healthier, and more effective in his work and life.
That same incremental, forgiving philosophy fits remarkably well with modern first responder wellness — especially in a profession where perfection is impossible and the work is relentlessly demanding. It’s worth thinking about as we stare down the barrel of 2026.
So … are you up for a new kind of New Year’s resolution?
Instead of making one sweeping New Year’s resolution that tries to fix everything at once, a more effective approach is to intentionally focus on one aspect of wellness at a time. Based on the virtues Franklin himself worked on in constant rotation, each one represents a common challenge for first responder wellness: sleep, nutrition, movement, stress, relationships, and recovery.
It’s important to note this is not about just “paying a little more attention” while hoping change happens in the background. It’s about deliberately prioritizing one area, putting meaningful effort into it, allowing that focus to shape daily decisions for an entire week.
The 13 first responder wellness virtues are:
(Yes, some of these sound a bit old-fashioned to modern ears. But keep reading … they really are relevant.)
During each week, you use the selected virtue as the primary lens through which you evaluate your choices. Training, recovery, meals, off-duty time, and boundaries are all filtered through that theme. The other areas don’t disappear, but they move into maintenance mode while attention is concentrated where it will have the most impact. At the end of the week, you do a quick self-evaluation before moving on to the next virtue, carrying forward what worked and refining what didn’t.
This rotating, single-focus approach mirrors Benjamin Franklin’s original system and reflects the reality of first responder life. It respects your limited time, unpredictable schedule, and fluctuating energy while still demanding commitment and accountability. Over the course of a year, this method allows you to address the full spectrum of wellness without overload, guilt, or burnout — and with far better odds of long-term success.
Here’s an explanation of each virtue, along with some suggested behaviors to cultivate (or avoid) as you focus on each one in succession.
1. Temperance: Fueling for the shift
For first responders, temperance means eating and drinking in a way that sustains performance across long shifts without swinging between extremes. It recognizes that perfect nutrition is rarely possible on duty, but chronic under-fueling or over-reliance on stimulants gets in the way of energy, mood, and recovery. Temperance is about consistency and adequacy — enough calories, protein, hydration, and micronutrients to support physical work, decision-making, and sleep — while avoiding patterns that lead to crashes, inflammation, or metabolic issues.
Supportive behaviors:
2. Silence: Mental decompression
First responders often move from call to call without pausing to process or reset. Because of this, silence requires cultivating the intentional mental quiet in a world dominated by alarms, radios, urgency, and constant turmoil. This virtue emphasizes brief but deliberate moments of decompression that allow the brain to disengage from hypervigilance, reducing cumulative stress and emotional spillover into home life.
Supportive behaviors:
3. Order: Anchors in an unpredictable schedule
For first responders, order is not rigid scheduling but establishing a few dependable anchors in otherwise chaotic days. Rotating shifts and unpredictable calls disrupt sleep, meals, and family routines. As any in public safety can attest, these challenges can leave the body and mind constantly off-balance. Order provides stability through repeatable habits that cue rest, readiness, and recovery, even when start times and call volumes change.
Supportive behaviors:
4. Resolution: Commitment under constraint
Resolution is the discipline to commit to what is achievable within the realities of public safety work. It rejects all-or-nothing thinking and focuses on follow-through under less-than-ideal conditions. This virtue values consistency over intensity and recognizes that progress comes from repeatedly honoring small commitments despite fatigue, overtime, or emotional strain.
Supportive behaviors:
5. Frugality: Protecting limited energy
First responders routinely give more than they get, leading to burnout if boundaries are not enforced. Frugality reframes personal energy (physical, emotional, and mental) as a finite resource that needs to be protected. This virtue encourages prioritizing where energy is spent and deliberately reducing unnecessary drains so recovery can keep pace with demand.
Supportive behaviors:
6. Industry: Minimum effective movement
Industry is consistent physical movement that supports job performance and long-term durability. It recognizes that elaborate training plans often fail under shift work, while short, frequent bouts of movement succeed. The goal is to maintain strength, mobility, and cardiovascular health so the body can handle sudden demands and recover between shifts.
Supportive behaviors:
7. Sincerity: Honest self-assessment
Sincerity is being radically honest with yourself about physical pain, fatigue, mood changes, and stress load. In first responder cultures, where toughness is often a huge priority, warning signs are often ignored until they become injuries, sleep disorders, or mental health crises. The virtue of sincerity emphasizes early recognition and course correction as professional responsibility.
Supportive behaviors:
8. Justice: Balancing service and self-care
For first responders, self-care is not a “nice to have,” but mandatory. First responders often prioritize others’ needs indefinitely while neglecting their own recovery. This imbalance shortens careers and strains relationships. Because of this, the virtue of justice makes it clear that if the job demands physical and emotional sacrifice, restoration must be treated as equally non-negotiable.
Supportive behaviors:
9. Moderation: Sustainable coping
Moderation addresses how first responders cope with stress, fatigue, and emotional weight. Maladaptive coping — whether through overtraining, overeating, overindulging in alcohol, or emotional withdrawal — often develops quietly. The virtue of moderation promotes coping strategies that relieve stress without creating new problems, supporting longevity rather than short-term escape.
Supportive behaviors:
10. Cleanliness: Resetting the environment
First responders tend to carry the physical and mental residue of the job home with them. Cleanliness represents both physical hygiene and psychological transition between work and home. Simple environmental resets can help the nervous system recognize the threat period is over, protecting family relationships and reducing stress carryover.
Supportive behaviors:
11. Tranquility: Nervous system regulation
The virtue of tranquility represents a deliberate focus on calming a nervous system conditioned for constant alertness. Chronic fight-or-flight activation disrupts sleep, digestion, mood, and cardiovascular health. Focusing on tranquility helps emphasize practices that help the body return to its baseline, reducing stress.
Supportive behaviors:
12. Chastity: Healthy boundaries in relationships
For first responders, chastity is best understood as protecting relationships through boundaries and intentional presence. Long shifts, emotional exhaustion, and exposure to trauma can strain connections at home. This virtue emphasizes quality over quantity and preserving emotional energy for the people who matter most.
Supportive behaviors:
13. Humility: Adaptability and life-long learning
Humility is accepting that the job changes you — and that you must adapt to make it through a long career. Bodies age, stress accumulates, and coping strategies must evolve. This virtue encourages learning, seeking guidance, and adjusting expectations without shame. After all, sustainable service requires support.
Supportive behaviors:
So, what’s the best way to implement this virtue-based “system”? Franklin tracked his virtues with a simple chart, making a notation when he fell short of his goal — not to shame himself, but to stay aware of his own progress.
First responders can do something similar without turning wellness into another full-time job:
The key is awareness and repetition, not perfection.
Big resolutions tend to fail because they demand everything at once. Incremental change works because it respects reality. By focusing on one slice of wellness at a time, first responders can make meaningful progress without burning out — or beating themselves up for being human.
Benjamin Franklin didn’t become a better person overnight, and neither will any of us. But by steadily whittling away at one area at a time, we can build healthier habits, longer careers, and better lives beyond the uniform.
