Back to Work : New Year Brings Visions of Uplifting Our Lives

The party’s over.

Here it is, the day after New Year’s, the official end of the holiday season. Those who had the holidays off are back in their places with long, solemn faces.

Suddenly, the boss is demanding that we actually work again--and we no longer have the excuse that our clients and various contacts are on vacation.

For that matter, all of those convenient December excuses have skulked into hibernation for the next 11 months. We can’t say that we need to go to the mall when we should be going to the gym. We can’t chow down on fudge and pumpkin pie in the name of Father Christmas. We can’t procrastinate family troubles until after Hanukkah.

Yet, we must admit, we sort of like this renaissance month. We’re fed up with overeating, tired of shopping, bored with “looking busy” at the job, and ready to address our problems rather than our greeting cards.

January is the contradictory month: anticlimactic and rejuvenating.

It is a month of hope, optimism and determination--those persevering qualities that often fade in the waning days of the old year.

And with it comes a unified energy to iron out those bothersome wrinkles in our lives. January makes us feel as if the world is at our feet, that this will be the year we do all those things left undone.

The month is paved with good intentions--and with gold for the Orange County enterprises that benefit from its burst of productivity.

Of course, any enterprise related to physical appearance can expect a flood of malcontents. Although we like to envision ourselves as much too deep to obsess on that which is only skin-deep, we also like for other people to envision us as physically fit and attractive.

Anyone who has muscled into a full-bodied aerobics class during January knows that health clubs hit the new year running.

“January is always our most successful month,” said Kevin Steele, director of member resources for Holiday Spas, a chain that has six clubs in Orange County.

“The first of the year marks the time when everyone is motivated to get into an exercise routine or to rekindle the old motivation they once had,” he said. “They come in and say, ‘I’ve been bad this last year--this is the year I’m really going to turn my life around.’ ”

Waist-watchers also flock to Weight Watchers. “In January, we have about 100% more membership renewals and new memberships than in other months of the year,” said Orla Lohmeier, advertising manager for Weight Watchers of Orange County, which has 35,000 members.

Those people who want a new look pronto , head for their hair stylists. “They don’t want to wait until they’ve lost weight--they want to see something dramatic right then and there,” said Neil Letham, artistic director of Jose Eber salon in South Coast Plaza.

“It’s instant gratification--they can change their appearance in one day by getting their hair cut and color changed,” he said.

What better place for instant gratification than a plastic surgeon’s office (that is, after the bruising heals)? Smaller thighs and noses are only a few thousand dollars away.

“We usually have more patients in January than in other months,” said Leonard Prutsok, an Orange plastic surgeon. “The new year tends to bring a heightened energy cycle that inspires people to come in.

“The common story we hear is that they’ve thought about it and thought about, and this is the year they’re going to do it,” Prutsok said. “If they haven’t thought about (plastic surgery) for a long time, then they should reconsider. It’s not something that should be undertaken on an impulse.”

More people go under the drill for cosmetic dental work during January than in other months, said Newport Beach dentist Paul M. Johnson. “January is all booked up,” he said. “It’s like anything: ‘Now it’s time to clean out that closet and to get my teeth fixed.’ ”

And because beauty is indeed skin deep, another year down the hatch stirs people to join the noble cause of saving their hides.

“January is a good month for selling series of facials,” said Sharon Orr, manager of Aida Grey skin care salon in South Coast Plaza. “At the beginning of the year, people are ready to commit themselves to a program.”

New Year’s resolutions, not surprisingly, breathe fire into programs designed to kick the nicotine habit. “We had a tremendous influx (of clients) last January,” medical director Grant Dawson said of the stop-smoking program at Metro-Med Family Medical Center in Fountain Valley.

“A lot of people tell us that they tried to quit on their own the previous January; they’ve waited a whole year and this year they don’t want to fail,” Dawson added. “The good thing about quitting in January is that people are more likely to get moral support from their peers, because everybody is trying to improve themselves in some way.”

Relationships are areas in which many people hope to improve in the new year. “The holidays tend to highlight all that is not right in a family,” said Carol Hughes, a family therapist in Laguna Hills. “People say, ‘My Christmas or my Hanukkah wasn’t happy, my family doesn’t look like the families on TV.’ ”

Hughes said she receives a deluge of calls in January from “people who have resolved to take care of their personal problems.”

“They look back over the old year and say, ‘I don’t want another year like this last one.’ If they’ve been depressed or if they have marital problems, they’re ready to take action.”

Robert Randall, managing attorney for the Huntington Beach branch of Jacoby & Meyers Law Offices, said divorce suits “really pick up in January.”

“(Clients) didn’t want to file for divorce during the holidays, but all the reasons for putting it off seem to disappear at the first of the year,” he said.

On the flip side are those who yearn to enter a relationship. “I place a third more ads in January than in other months,” said Laura Price, owner of “Singles Connection,” a matchmaking newsletter based in Anaheim.

This month, the newsletter features about 500 ads. “Over the holidays, people realize they’re alone and would like a relationship,” Price said.

The changing of the calendar elicits reassessment of career life as well as personal life. Management Recruiters International does 35% of its business in the first quarter of the year, said John Lewis, general manager of the job placement firm’s office in Orange.

“A lot of people make the resolution that they’re going to find a new job,” Lewis said. “Plus, companies tend to do more hiring in the first quarter because they’ve got a new budget and new positions approved.”

Sandra Young, co-owner of Women’s Focus--a Tustin-based career counseling company--agreed that many a New Year’s wish list includes: “Make an exciting job change.”

“January is our biggest time of the year,” Young said. “It’s like joining a gym--everyone coasts through the holidays and then says, ‘Now I’m going to get serious.’ ”

Toastmaster International experiences “a big push every January” of professionals wanting to improve their speaking skills, said spokeswoman Debbie Horn.

“We’re seeing that more people are joining because of the recession,” said Horn, a manager of the club’s 5,000-member Orange County chapter. “They think they need a little help to either get a new job or stay in the job they have.”

The seasonal drive toward self-improvement is not all work and no play.

James Callaway, manager of the Arthur Murray Dance Studio in El Toro, said that Fred Astaire wanna-bes come waltzing in for lessons after having been reminded of their two left feet at a holiday ball.

“Frequently, they went to a party where dancing was going on and they felt awkward and embarrassed,” Callaway said. “And they say, ‘ Next Christmas, I’m not going to miss out.’ ”

January motivates some people to go above and beyond such earthly pursuits as career changes and flat stomaches--and reach for the stars. Newport Beach astrologer James Baker works overtime during the new year’s cusp.

“I’ll have to extend my services to Sundays this month,” Baker predicted. “This is when my clients come in for a psychological weather report. They wouldn’t start 1991 without me.”