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Self-awareness and choosing personal growth goals April 6, 2014

Posted by Dennis Mellersh in Concept of personal development, Goal Setting and Realization.
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The process of choosing our goals needs to be an integral part of our overall personal process of self-actualization if we are to reach our potential in our personal improvement efforts.

In conscientiously and regularly working at a program of self-improvement or personal development, two results will usually occur: we will increase our self-awareness, and we will improve our self-knowledge.

This acceleration in our understanding of ourselves in turn will help us in identifying our strengths and talents and in clarifying our areas of lesser strengths – aspects of our personality in which we may want to increase our effectiveness.

It’s important that our goals be ones that we choose or decide upon after this process of introspection.

As you have probably already discovered, the need for having personal goals is one of the most common recommendations in the literature of the self-empowerment movement.

But the goals must be “ours”, not ones which we think, from our reading, “should” be our goals.

If the goals are not ones we feel passionate about achieving, if they are “should do” goals instead of “want to” or “personally need to do” goals, then failure is a strong probability.

Thought for today

“People are not lazy. They simply have impotent goals – that is, goals that do not inspire them.”
– Tony Robbins

Personal growth and day-tight compartments April 3, 2014

Posted by Dennis Mellersh in Living in the Now.
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One of the challenges we face after starting a program of personal development is that the increased self-awareness we inevitably create can sometimes lead to discouragement at our perceived lack of quick progress.

When this happens, it can be helpful to try to follow the example of professional athletes who, although facing setbacks and potential failures very day, nevertheless persevere in their efforts to maximize their talents.

If you listen to interviews with professional athletes, their approach to their work usually follows a pattern:

Preparation: They continually prepare for improved performance each day

Focus on today: They try to live in day-tight compartments. Failure yesterday does not mean failure today; rather, today is a new opportunity to do better

Stressing routines: They keep doing the routines that have worked for them in the past and modify them if necessary to achieve better results

Concentration: They focus on the task at hand instead of fretting about missed o0pportunities yesterday, or worrying how they are going to meet challenges tomorrow

Control what can be controlled: They make an effort to concentrate on the elements of their lives that are within their control and try to not worry about the elements that they can’t control