There's many a sigh across the nation tonight. RRSP season has come and gone -- and we've survived it...notwithstanding the guilt-making statements of pending disaster, poverty and disappointment if we fail to provide for our future.

Investment, contribution, interest, returns ... funny how these words come to have a singular focus at this time of year. How they appear to carry a weight - even a negative connotation - beyond reason. All too quickly our perspectives can become jaded, our self-talk filled with self-pity and derision. And before we know it, our glass, once half-full, appears to be more than half empty.

Strange how we allow ourselves to live our lives "from the outside in". How we succumb to expectations, demands, deadlines and duty. Where we live our lives to please others first. Where the locus of power comes from external influences rather than intrinsic values.

What if we were to invest in our dreams - taking a few moments to define and affirm our goals, to visualize them, to take a single action step to their fulfillment each and every day? What if we were to contribute a moment here and there to the issues of the day, to show a genuine interest in the needs of others?

And the returns?, you ask.

Well, they may not make us very wealthy, but would life not be that much richer - for ourselves...and others?