I considered creating this as a new thing, but instead I’ve decided that investing in myself should be an unending life goal. So what do I mean by it?

• It means looking after myself by eating the right foods and exercising properly. I’ve tried improving my diet before but never had the right support, but this last year has seen me begin to succeed in ways I hadn’t thought I could. Tennis and cycling are definitely going to help me improve my fitness level.
• It means I should never stop learning. You may have noticed I get through a lot of books. I also get through a lot of magazines too. I intend to be more imaginative and creative about how I obtain the books – getting review copies of business books I’m interested in is a good start. The only magazine I intend to read regularly is The Economist, which I have a pretty cheap subscription to.
• It means never losing control of my finances again, so that I can invest in myself. I readily admit to not having done such a bang-up job on this in the past. However, with the debt mountain dwindling every month, my spending mostly under control, and new targets forming, this is not something that will ever happen again. Note that I didn’t say “I never want this to happen again”, but rather “it will never happen again”.
• It means creating an environment for myself where I am surrounded by people I want to be surrounded by, and to be happy with the place I call home. Career-wise, I’m doing pretty well on this. Since I left for university, I’ve never had anywhere which felt like home, although I have now found somewhere that feels very much like home.
• It means exploring life with the people I love. This is related to the second point, since I always learn so much from others.
• It means making other people happy. I consider this to be an investment in myself, since nothing gives me greater pleasure than making those I love and care for happy, especially if I can do it in unexpected and creative ways. It sounds really selfish to put it like that, but that’s not how it’s meant! This also means letting those people be who they want to be, do what they want to do, and providing support to them in those ambitions.

This turns out to be a sort of catch-all for a few other things I’ve checked off over time, but I like the idea of having an over-arching goal for this. My intention from now on is to give anything which falls in the above categories a priority over other, more minor things. That means giving more conscious thought to decisions I make, listening more to how I feel about things, and making my case more confidently and cogently than I have in the past.