I turn 30 today
I turn 30 today.
I used to see 30 as old. I don’t anymore. In fact, I feel like my life is just getting started. The biggest reason behind that is that I’m mentally and physically healthier than I have ever been. I also feel my confidence has grown a lot faster in my late 20s.
There’s nothing that special about ending a year with a zero, but it’s a good opportunity for me to set goals. And I love setting goals.
I still want to use this year to take more risks. Probably my biggest problem with TCLA, the business I run, is that I try to do everything myself. It’s an ego thing. I really care about the quality of my output, and I feel I can trust myself to produce a high standard. I need to learn to trust others to get there too.
So what risks do I want to take? Well, I want to invest money into things that will make a step change for the business. This includes:
Hiring a junior videographer to film our behind-the-scenes of building the business at TCLA
Hiring our developers to redo our whole website
Work together in an office space and hire more people so I’m not always at max capacity (we are hiring!)
Enroll in a coding bootcamp so I can better understand what is possible to build
Complete Khan Academy math courses to GCSE level, then do the GMAT, and a master’s in finance (see my desire to build a foundational understanding of Math)
Contact people I want to meet and build relationships with
I’ve always been scared to spend too much at TCLA. This is probably a natural reality of having a bootstrapped business. But last year, our profitability tripled, so I feel more comfortable with our buffer.
I also know that investing our money in the right places is going to lead to opportunities I can’t price in right now. A good example is the law firm dashboard we are building into our forum. It’s launching privately next week, but publicly next month. I think it looks really good. And it’s the coolest part of building a business that I need to remember: you can build things that never previously existed and make a difference to the status quo.
On a personal level, I feel very settled. I’ve just moved and I am excited for the year ahead. A few goals here I want to work on include:
Making sure I journal daily about what I did during the day. I am good at notetaking quick thoughts, but I still haven’t cracked an end-of-day reflection
Replacing social media with reading. I find Twitter useful to stay up to date, but it can equally be an unhelpful time sink, and I don’t feel like I learn anything from it in the way I used to. An easy win here would be to buy a small Kindle and pull out the Kindle instead of my phone.
Spending more time with my friends and family. I’ve really fallen off here. I’m working a lot more, and I know I need to be more intentional about it.
Eating more, consistently. I’ve made a big change since I restarted personal training, but I feel like I make progress and then fall back, too often. On Friday I’m attempting my birthday lifts (100kg bench, 120kg squat, 130kg deadlift).
Doing cardio once a week. When I’m at the gym, I mostly lift weights. I tried a boxing class for the first time in a long time recently. This feels like a good opportunity to make it fun.
Just pushing ahead with what I want. The older I get, the less fear I feel. This is something I didn’t know was going to happen. But I am finding it easier to trust that is okay to do what I want.
Excited for the next year!
Jaysen