The key is to make small accumulating changes. Start with very small things you know you can manage and work up to bigger ones. See Matt Cutts' video Try something new for 30 days. This video is 3 and a half minutes of your life well spent.

Think about your life in different areas and start to work on each of them.

Career: Ask yourself where you want to be in 5, 10, 20, 40 years. How are you going to get there? What do you need to start doing now? When are you going to start?

Health: Do you get enough exercise? Find something physical you like doing and give it a go. If you can't think of anything get a part time job that is physically demanding and think of it as a way of exercising and put the money away. Dance is better than sport because you can keep it up into old age and because of the social aspect. Do you eat right? You know what good food is and what junk food is, start eating more of the former and less of the latter. Get enough sleep.

Body: Do you want to put on muscle? You need four things,1. the correct exercise, find this out from a regular trainer rather than some medicine show guru, 2. enough protein, protein shakes do work follow the instructions and don't go overboard with them 3. Recovery time i.e. get enough sleep and 4. enough water

Social. Get out of the habit of ruminating on negative things. Get into the habit of exchanging small talk, particularly with strangers. If interacting with people is difficult for you a good place to start is Carnegie's How to Make Friends and Influence People.

General. Make the practice of gratitude a habit. Keep a list of all the small changes you make as you make them. You will be surprised at how far you can go in a few months.

Wastes. What do you waste time on? Do something more useful with that time instead. What do you waste money on? Same thing.

Bad habits. Do you smoke? If so, giving up is a real hard challenge. Start by achieving smaller things bit by bit to get a sense of self-control and success. Then set smoking challenges you can succeed at e.g. limiting amounts, temporary cessations (if you decide to give up for a day and succeed, you have achieved something, if you decide to give up permanently and last a week, you have failed and set yourself up for future failures). One of the reasons for smoking is that it releases dopamine. Many people find that starting to exercise also achieves this and reduces the desire to smoke.

If you are nowhere near the person you would like to be or could be, travelling to new places as cheaply as possible is a good place to start. If this is not a possibility for you, doing long walks is a good alternative.

Happy New Year, everyone.