How much is non-investment really costing you?

When it comes to looking after your home it can be much easier to justify spending money to repair, replace, or purchase things that continue to make it a comfortable place to live in. It makes sense to look after your home, after all – it’s where you live, sleep, most often eat, and entertain yourself and guests. It’s your own private space that you call “home” and quite probably you cherish having it.

However, when it comes to making the same kinds of investment in ourselves, it’s much easier to justify spending money (and time) on other things first that appear “more important”. When we think about ourselves we often only see the costs of actually doing something rather than not doing it. We see the limitations. We worry what others will think. One of the biggest limiting beliefs is that we often don’t feel we deserve to invest in ourselves.

That said, we’re also not used to having to take responsibility for investing in ourselves. At school we have a set timetable from which there is no deviation at all until you get to choose your subjects at around the age of 15. We’re thrown into complete trauma because we’ve just never had that choice before, rarely encouraged to make such choices, and so don’t really know how to.

There’s so much conflict that can take place around this that it’s often just easier to bumble along hoping it’ll all be all right in the end. Which of course, most often it isn’t.

So what are the costs of non-self-investment? Here are a few to get you thinking:

• physical health can deteriorate
• mental and emotional health can suffer
• we fall behind in our particular skills and become less employable
• we feel demotivated and disheartened about life - we can become stressed and anxious because we see the world changing and we’re not keeping up with itrn- we feel unable to tackle new challenges
• our range of activities remains static or reduces until we end up with little or nothing
• we have less to talk about and share with our partner and friends
• we become stuck, confused, and unable to move forward.

If you can tick “yes” to any of those above, perhaps it’s time to think about some “self-investment”.

Now, the thing to bear in mind about “investment” is that it doesn’t have to mean financial investment. Time and effort are also key players in this area. In fact, the latter two can be even more effective than just the first. It’s all very well making a financial investment, but if you don’t put the time and effort in as well you’re just tipping money down the drain!

Think about bartering or exchanging services. If you’re a therapist offer a treatment in exchange. If you’re a carpenter or some other kind of skilled, manual worker, offer to build or repair something. You get the picture I’m sure.

When it comes to working on our emotional and mental health/skills, yes it’s great to work with a coach or therapist and you can get a lot done in just one or two sessions. However, it’s not absolutely necessary or the only way forward. There are hundreds of books and DVDs out there now that can help you.

When it comes to physical health, yes going to the gym can be great, but there are many ways of exercising that don’t cost much or anything at all. Walking or running is free, and often a local park will have tennis courts that can be free to make use of. There are fitness DVDs and interactive software that you can plug into your TV to use.

Meditation is also free and is a great way to quiet the mind and prepare for the day ahead, and/or review the day that has passed. Joining a group that does meditation can be inexpensive and it also gets you out the house motivating you to do it rather than fall in to the “I’ll do it later” excuses.

There are many activity groups that are free to join or cheap to take part in where you’ll be doing something that you enjoy, learning or developing a skill, and sharing/meeting with new people.

These are just some very basic ways that you can invest in yourself without spending a fortune financially. Of course, if you can afford to invest more financially in yourself that’s great – just make sure you also invest your time, effort, and commitment as well.

I would quite happily put my head above the parapet and say that non-investment in the self is much more expensive and investment in the self. Especially when you think about the costs of non-investment. The benefits of self-investment? Well I’m sure you’re aware of these already but here’s a few:

• increased self worth
• improved, and sustained, physical health
• more opportunities open up in so many areas of your life
• increased self confidence
• enjoying life more fully
• more opportunities to share with others
• more employable and able to get that promotion you want
• increased sense of wellbeing and achievement

There are many others too as we’re not all motivated by the same things.

So when it comes to investing in yourself, where are you now? What one or two things can you do, right now, that will help you feel better about your life and where it’s headed. How much are you worth?

Isn’t it about time you did a bit more self-investment before you fall any further behind?