SOME people like to try to live their lives as entirely in the present as they can. It's a kind of religion, a "now" thing. It requires a particular view of time, a focus on the present as if one were plastered on the leading face of a comet hurtling into the future and unable to see the blazing trail the comet's passage is cutting across the sky.

This "living in the moment" is, of course, not a particularly sustainable state for most of us, since we seem pre-wired as a species to take a longer-term view of things. Stick us on that "now comet" and after a short bit of high octane shrieking along the lines of someone going over the crest on the Big Dipper, we sneak a look at the watch and wonder how long we've been doing this, and whether the comet's on some kind of cyclical orbit and how long it will be before the view in front of us comes round again.

The point is that as a species we've been engaged in splitting the continuous flow of time up into key, repetitive "events" for about as long as we've been walking upright. It begins with birth and death and, for our dim and distant ancestors, this encompassed the birth and death of the year rather more than the incidental occasion of another happy addition to the tribe.

In many ways, the anniversaries we all celebrate so easily, all hark back to the awesome ceremonies that greeted the return of the spring and the end of winter. New life for the world, after all, meant vastly more to the tribe than any one particular life. Celebrating those epochal "returns" extended easily enough to celebrating the return of the day on which each individual had come into the world.

Paddy O'Donal, professor of psychology at Glasgow University, argues that once we recognise the ancient roots of anniversary celebrations, it is easy to see that the idea of the anniversary always carries the two related ideas of birth and death. This will not be a revelation to those who habitually suffer from depression when their birthday, or even New Year's Day, comes around again. "Another year older and what's achieved, except getting a step closer to the end of it all?" they might exclaim if you ask such folk how they feel on their birthday.

The simplest defence to this kind of anniversary-driven self-criticism is to set some clear personal goals right at the start of the new year, and not just for the year ahead. As all the "life coaches" like to point out, if you want something, or want to be something or someone, then plan for it. It won't happen by accident. So while it might sound way too speculative for some tastes, putting down on paper what your ideal milestones would be at 30, 40, 50, 60 and 70 makes sense.

Incidentally, there is no need to stop at 70. The latest mortality statistics suggest that anyone in the UK turning 30 this year has a 50 per cent chance of seeing their 100th birthday. So you might want to add goals for your 80th and 90th birthdays to the list as well – reaching 100 would, for most of us, be a goal in itself, unless you want to add: "with my own teeth…"

Obviously everyone has their own ideas of what makes a worthwhile milestone. "Fit, the right body weight and a millionaire by 40," is not a bad one if that description doesn't already fit. A good many goals imply a set of disciplines and procedures as pre-requisites to their fulfilment. Of themselves these are more likely to be "good for you" than not, irrespective of whether they lead ultimately to your stated goal.

Adding physical goals to career or life achievement goals is also worthwhile. While obesity and its attendant ills can have many causes, some of which lie outside the control of the individual, the primary cause in the UK today is taking on more calories than you need on a daily basis. Add a low-to-zero exercise lifestyle complete with plenty of alcohol and the fat quickly builds up. Setting clear goals helps to cut down on this kind of drift.

In the words of John Masefield: "And all I ask is a tall ship/and a star to steer her by." These goals are the star, without which you are doomed to flounder around like a rudderless hulk. Happy anniversary…