By the time you read this New Year celebrations will be fading into distant memory. So, the question is, assuming you made any, how are you getting on with your resolutions for 2025?

According to various surveys you can find on line (and there are many) up to 14 million people (20% of the UK population) will make new year resolutions. The top three most common resolutions are always those to do with diet, losing weight, quitting smoking and taking more exercise. The same surveys show that these are also the resolutions which have the highest chance of not being kept. 

Entering around number seven in the ‘resolution top ten’ are the good intentions related to taking up new activities and volunteering. The good news is that people who decide on these sorts of resolutions seem much less likely to quit. 

The partners in the River Torridge Heritage Group have approximately two thousand members and supporters between them. Some two hundred of these are the volunteers who steward in museums and at events, repair and paint vessels, lay track and maintain trains, repair canals and create visitors experiences, digitise newspapers and create newsletters, and so much more. 

For many people volunteering means continuing to use skills acquired from a lifetime of work but it is not just retirees. On Steamship Freshspring some younger people, who often had their education and work prospects disrupted by covid, used volunteering to get back into regular activity. Working on these projects and with support from the volunteer team several have now gone on to secure full time employment or returned to college to complete their studies. 

All sorts of organisations are looking for volunteers. One of the objectives for the TTVS charity, based in Bridgeland Street, is to support local voluntary organisations. They have contacts with over 380 local volunteer organisations and nearly 500 volunteers registered. Even the smallest volunteer organisations invariably need a constitution, bank account and the people to operate it. Check out the adverts in TTVS Volunteer Centre or talk to them. They will try to match personal interests with the needs of the different charities and organisations. 

Volunteers help make things happen in their communities and make them better places to work, live and visit. It’s not too late if you didn’t make a resolution on the stroke of midnight. Volunteer now!