Every challenge I’ve done over the past year I have either failed to complete or barely pass. I’ve attempted 8 challenges and each failure has only made me more aware of how much more discipline I needed to change certain areas of my life.

Let’s take a look at some of the challenges:

• 30-day ab challenge (#fitgirlabs)
• 30-day squat challenge with Jen Selter
• Myleik Teele’s #WellReadWomanChallenge
• Myleik’s #NoSleepinChallenge
• 52 week savings challenge
• A week of clean eating

Let’s take for instance the 30-day squat challenge. I’ve started it 4 times and never gotten past week 1. Does this mean I’m not worried about my health & wellness? Not necessarily – it means that the squat challenge is not for me and I’ve got to put more effort into another avenue to get the glutes I want. I also tried the 365-day weekly savings challenge with a group of friends. I thought that the good ‘ole accountability trick would work for me. I was in a group chat and every week we were supposed to post a photo or proof of our deposit as a “check-in” to report our status. I’ve had to start that over 3 times. I totally failed.

“Failure is an essential step toward success,” as my good friend Stacey Flowers simply puts it.

Of course I want to save money and have a healthier physique, but I’ve realized that I didn’t finish those challenges because I am not motivated by competition. I am motivated by goals to achieve what is important to me and the act of completion just to say I did it is not enough for me. I actually need to have a goal in mind in order for me to achieve something. If I have a goal in mind, I can learn to hold myself accountable and be successful at it.

I’ve always had a personal level of ambition to stay productive after grad school but the success of a challenge means more to me than just being a good time manager. I took these challenges to make myself aware of my flaws and address my thinking process behind each. Believe it or not, those were all worth my time. A notion a personal investment or what I call “Life Development.” Each challenge created a new experience and led to my growth. To justify all of the time, it led me to invest about $3,350 last year on both my personal growth and my business! I can say with confidence that I my money was not wasted and I didn’t purchase anything just to say I did it. What did I spend my money on?

• Grad school travel expenses & books
• Professional courses on Public Relations
• Digital softwares to enhance my freelance journalism career
• Power Networking Conference with FraserNet
• Website domain & business branding updates
• Other communications related workshops relevant in my field
• Professional organization memberships (i.e. IABC)

If you’re stuck on exactly how or where you should invest your time, I recommend you thoroughly understand your personal values before investing your time or money into something. If you don’t, you could be easily swayed to waste your time or money on someone else’s goals, losing sight of the life you want to live. It’s time to speak up, have the courage to seek new experiences and ultimately live the life YOU love and deserve!