How are you tracking with your New Year’s resolutions, or the intentions you set at the end of 2012?
For years I made the same resolution on December 31: lose weight. Some years I did, and others I put weight on, but I’ve come to realise if I weigh less at the end of the year than I did on January 1 then I’ve achieved something.
But this post is not about losing weight, or resolutions. It’s about one intention I set at the end of last year that will come to fruition this week.
Feeling like I needed a new challenge after I finished writing my upcoming book, Business & Baby on Board, I applied to study Honours in Journalism, Media and Communications at the University of Tasmania. My research project will look at the changes in journalism since the advent of social media.
I start my course on Thursday (February 28) and in the days that lead up to that date I have felt a mixture of excitement and nerves. It has been 17 years since I stepped foot in a university and a lot has changed in that time, including me establishing a career and building a business, getting married and having two children, living overseas and moving interstate.
The internet has become a research tool since I went to uni the first time around, cafes sell coffee that doesn’t look like the swill I used to get from the cafeteria between lectures and everyone now has a mobile phone. A lot has happened in that time, but I made a commitment to my own personal development this year and so I face this brave new world of education in the 21st century.
So why go back after all this time? Because I know I can be better. I know I need to keep challenging myself to achieve success in business and in life. I want to grow my mind – and the possibilities of where that may lead inspired me to fill in that application form.
In the words of Jim Rohn, “Learning is the beginning of wealth. Learning is the beginning of health. Learning is the beginning of spirituality. Searching and learning is where the miracle process all begins.”
What is on your personal development agenda?
