Personal Development Ideas

Imagination, persistence, and courage in personal development March 11, 2012

In our efforts towards self-improvement or personal development, discouragement, and even fear, may set in periodically as our personal growth goals are not being realized as fast as we would like.

In this case persistence and courage are two of the personal development traits that we need to develop. While doing some research on various approaches to goal setting and self-realization, I came across the following statement by Winston S. Churchill, in which he speaks of persistence and courage in trying to stay true to our guiding principles: “Never give in; never give in, never, never, never, never – in nothing, great or small, large or petty – never give in except to convictions of honour and good sense.”

For sensitive and introspective people who are working on a program of self-improvement or personal growth and development, however, our personalities can sometimes produce fears and self-doubts and thereby interfere with our efforts towards our personal growth goals. Our imagination, can lead us into periods of intellectual uncertainty and fearfulness.

However, as Churchill points out in another comment, these fears are normal for sensitive, imaginative people: “You cannot tell from appearances how things will go. Sometimes imagination makes things out far worse than they are; yet without imagination not much can be done. Those people who are imaginative see many more dangers than perhaps exist; certainly many more than will happen; but then they must also pray to be given that extra courage to carry this far-reaching imagination.”

These quotations are from a speech Churchill gave in 1941 during the 2nd World War, a talk that has become known as his “Never Give In” speech.