What is the greatest gift someone could give you?
When thinking about gifts that could change our lives, my mind tends towards financial gifts. That is because we have never been particularly affluent, although thanks to my wife we are comfortable enough to be able to afford me the opportunity to slow down. However, security comes from more than gifts or lottery wins. It comes from the freedom to do what you have always dreamed of.
The greatest and most important gift that someone could give me would be self confidence. It’s something I have never had and it’s something that I know has held me back over the years. I can have lots of people telling me that I am good at what I do but I am unlikely to believe it. A number of my former friends and colleagues have, or appeared to have, iron clad self confidence and they have got much further in their careers than I ever could. I know my career could have been much more successful if I had believed in myself more. Unfortunately it is a way that the brain works that is, I believe, innate. If you are a self confident person you will assume that if something goes wrong, it’s nothing to do with you because you are brilliant. I have met many of those people over the years and they succeed while the people with them stay put.
So, if my fairy godmother is listening, even at this late stage, I want iron clad self confidence please, together with an apology for waiting so long before giving it to me!
What colleges have you attended?
Clearly the person who decided on this prompt is American. It’s the only place, as far as I am aware, where university is referred to as college. In the UK, there are Sixth form colleges which are more relaxed versions of schools. In these colleges, students are often taking more practical subjects somewhat similar to the old technical colleges of the post war period. There are also some Public Schools in the UK which are referred to as colleges, most famously Eton. In another example of the divide between the UK and the US, Public Schools are the name we give to our private education institutions!
When it comes to Higher Education, we used to have very much a two tier system. When I studied for my Economics degree, I did so at Staffordshire Polytechnic. The Polytechnic system was a very good way to broaden access to Higher Education in the UK in the late 60s onwards. They took students with lower A Level results or mature students like myself (mature referring to those who had spent at least five years out of education, definitely not behaviour in my case!) who universities would not even look at. Nowadays, all the old polytechnics are referred to as universities, including Staffordshire University in Stoke on Trent. It has removed the official division between the two, but students, teachers and parents are aware of which universities are long standing and which changed their name in the 90s and 2000s. I think it’s perhaps gone too far in the UK with 50% or so of school leavers being accepted into higher education and a relaxation of standards shall we say! However, the way that the Polytechnic system democratised education was very important and my journey through life would have been utterly different without it. The degree was the reason I was able to become a teacher and go to Japan, Hong Kong, Saudi Arabia and Australia and the reason my opportunities were expanded beyond working in an office.
What are your biggest challenges?
If you are a regular reader of my blog you will know that I stepped back from full time work last year. If you are interested you can find a few posts about it, but to cut a long story short it’s been quite difficult to decide how to still make progress and what that progress will look like.
In 2026, Happy New Year by the way, I have decided to develop certain aspects of myself and I have made a set of resolutions to focus on those aspects. My biggest challenge will be to ensure that I keep working towards that improvement. I shared those resolutions in my post yesterday in the hope that once I had announced it publicly, as it were, I would be more motivated to ensure that I do things to the best of my ability.
So, 2026 will be a year of challenges, both planned and no doubt unplanned, but I am really looking forward to meeting those challenges head on. Wish me luck.
As we stand on the threshold of 2026, and as many people wave a relieved goodbye to 2025, I wanted to look forward to my first full year after full time work and to share my goals. For once, I can focus just on myself and my wants and needs. It’s liberating and not as selfish as it sounds. By becoming a better version of myself I can be a more effective person for those who live with or learn from me. So, I have seven goals for 2026 and I will share them with you now to make sure that I feel more motivated to achieve them. I will keep you posted on how it goes.
Whether you are setting resolutions or not I sincerely hope that the year ahead will be better than the year we are leaving. Take care of yourself and those you love. Good luck for 2026!
David Pearce - Popular Culture and Personal Passions 