Investing well is hard enough, and introducing your personal values into the mix only compounds the confusion.

What matters most? How can I have the biggest impact? And am I a traitor to myself if I own stocks in companies I would otherwise shun?

Consider just one issue that inspires deep feelings: animal welfare. It is one of the newest niches that socially responsible investment companies seek to serve, and it offers a useful template for the kinds of questions that all of us need to ask if we want to craft a portfolio that points the same way as our moral compass.

There are two noteworthy examples of how one can attempt this.

First, the US Vegan Climate ETF. It is an index of sorts, with 268 American stocks, and it begins with subtraction: removing companies, and even whole industries, that it considers animal unfriendly. Pharmaceuticals? Poof, because of all the animal testing. Companies that extract and refine fossil fuels are gone, too. After all, animals are outdoors more than we tend to be, so climate change threatens many of them even more than us.