You are tormented by depression, you hate life and are looking for the culprits of failures: blame your spinelessness on greenhouse upbringing, bad work on a picky boss, loneliness on selfish friends who are not interested in your problems? And in general, for every incident you always have a million culprits, besides yourself? But in fact, the source of all your failures is you, only you and no one else. And only you can fix everything.
To change your life for the better, change yourself first. It is for this purpose that self-development of the individual exists. To begin with, let's figure out what, in fact, this concept means.
What is self-development?
Self-development is a conscious process that a person carries out without any external support, using only his moral and physical resources in order to improve his potential and realize himself as a person. Self-development is impossible without:
- setting specific goals;
- having beliefs;
- create installations onaction.
Identical and inextricably linked with self-development concept is personal growth. This is self-education of a person, during which he improves his positive qualities, his actions become more effective and, as a result, his personal potential increases significantly, which helps to achieve success in all areas of life.
What is it made of?
The concepts of "self-education", "personal potential", "success" sound rather abstract. All this can be achieved only through concrete actions. And personal growth and self-development are processes that give positive results, both moral and material, only under the condition of constant painstaking work on oneself. Let's take a closer look at what actions are required of us in order to change for the better.
Self-development is undoubtedly a big and important step, but you also need to make a plan of action for yourself to achieve your goals. Don't think that your life can change in one second or in a day. It takes a lot of time to accomplish great things. But if you try hard, the result will certainly meet all your expectations.
Personal self-development can be divided into five stages, which are inextricably linked:
1) awareness of its necessity;
2) learning needs;
3) self-knowledge;
4) strategizing;
5) action.
Self-development programrequires a careful approach to each of its points. Let's consider them in more detail.
Step 1. Recognize the need
Before you take action, you must clearly understand why you need it and if you really want to change something. At this point, the subject of your irritation does not play a significant role. Either you are not satisfied with the level of income, or you want people to perceive you differently, or you need some changes in appearance …
All these and any other desires have something in common: they must be based on a powerful irresistible desire for change and a complete willingness to use their maximum strength to achieve their goals.
The goal of self-development is to overcome the fear of leaving the comfort zone and stop being afraid of change. If you are ready for this, you can start resetting your life.
Step 2. Studying needs
To change your life for the better, you need to decide which aspects of it require refinement and improvement. To understand and articulate what you want, do the following exercise.
Take a sheet of paper and divide it into two parts. In the first half, list in a column everything that does not suit you. In the other - ways to solve these problems and the results you want to achieve.
Then number the items from the second column depending on the possibility of their implementation: from simple to complex. This will help you formulate your short-term and long-term goals and create an action plan to achieve them.
After compiling this list, no needtackle everything at the same time. Such a strategy often leads to the fact that, performing a bunch of tasks at once, a person is very dispersed and cannot solve any of them qualitatively. Proceed gradually, first paying attention to simpler problems and gradually moving on to complex ones. Only by following such a system will you be able to achieve maximum results.
Step 3. Knowing Yourself
Once you've set your goals, figure out what's going on inside you. You must clearly understand which of your qualities will help you achieve your goals, and which, on the contrary, will interfere. Everyone has the ability to self-development, but not everyone can use it because of their other character traits.
Try to assess your capabilities and abilities as objectively as possible, so that on the path of self-development you will be ready for the steps that you yourself (often unconsciously) will substitute.
You will also need a written exercise in your soul-searching. This time you need to put down on paper your positive and negative character traits. Be as objective as possible: do not overpraise or humiliate yourself. Just describe what is. And to get more accurate information, ask someone close to compare the traits you listed with the real state of affairs.
So you will not only find out what people who care about you think about you, but you will also be able to compare how you position yourself with how it looks from the outside.
Step 4. Draw up a strategy
Self-development is not only knowledge, butalso planning. When you have decided what you want, and understand what qualities will help you achieve your goals, it is time to draw up a plan of concrete actions.
The self-development program cannot give a universal answer to the question: “What should be done?” Everyone has their own priorities and desires. But we all have something in common: we want to be happy. But how - everyone decides for himself.
You choose what you need to do to get your way. In this case, you must adhere to the following rules:
1. Assess your capabilities objectively and set goals that you can realistically achieve at this stage of your life. If you want more - take on its achievement a little later, when you reach a new level. The path of self-development cannot be called simple and short, but your efforts will certainly bring you pleasant results.
2. Remember: even the smallest victory is a step taken on the steps leading up. The more steps you take, the higher you will advance.
3. Set yourself specific deadlines for achieving each goal. When you have everything scheduled by dates (or at least by approximate periods of time), it is much easier to work for the result than for an abstract desire.
Don't get discouraged if something doesn't work the first time. Belief in yourself, your dreams and positive thinking works wonders. If you have already decided to do something, then go all the way, and personal growth and self-development will help you in this.
Step 5. Let's act
All of the above isdry theory, and practice should begin this very minute. No need to say that you will change something tomorrow or from next week, or from the first day. Do not put off until later what you can do now, because the sooner you start, the sooner you will achieve results.
The tasks of self-development seem simple in theory, but in reality, a lot of obstacles await you. Whatever happens, do not doubt your dreams, forget about the failures of the past, because the future is what is happening right now, and it depends only on you what it will be.
What's stopping us?
On your way to achieving your goals, you will encounter a lot of obstacles. But all external barriers are nothing compared to internal ones. Only by defeating yourself, you will be able to subjugate the surrounding reality and reach your destination. You must know your main enemies by sight, because self-development is a constant struggle. So, get acquainted…
Doubts
Inside each of us sits an evil censor who criticizes our every decision. Even if at first glance it looks the most correct and rational of all possible, we still ask ourselves the question: “Maybe we shouldn’t?”, “Are you sure?”, “Let's not risk it better?”
The voice of doubt… In some cases, it really saves us from erroneous reckless decisions, but sometimes it prevents us from making a breakthrough towards our dream. How to deal with it? Its main enemy is desire. Only in it lies the power sufficient to overcome any doubts. No wonder oncethey said: “If you really want, you can fly into space.”
Desire gives us an inexhaustible source of energy, it inspires and inspires us, makes us fight for what we really need, kicks everyone out of their comfort zone. Only armed with a real sincere desire, you can overcome any doubts.
Laziness
Laziness is another problem of self-development. But it does not exist, it is a kind of placebo, fiction. But wrong desires and dreams are quite real. They poison our lives, forcing us to sit still and not strive.
If you have no incentive, then there will be no desire either. How can you change something if you don't want it with all your heart? No way. Dreams are the fuel of our self-development. The nourishment they give us is equal to their scale. And if the dream is useless, then it will not really work to refuel from it.
But when you have a really worthwhile goal, you don’t even want to remember any laziness. After all, we are driven by a strong desire for change.
If you don't have a truly inspiring dream, find one. If it doesn’t work out, change your social circle, reach out to people with ambitious goals, and you yourself will have the same ones. Fight for your dreams. And you will certainly be able to defeat laziness!
Habits
Habits are invaluable fuel for laziness. They appear as a result of actions that are constantly repeated. Habits are both good and bad. But, regardless of the level of their usefulness, they are all brought by usto automatism.
Where do they come from? When a person performs the same actions for a long time, he gets used to them, and they become an integral part of his life. Many people fall into a catastrophic dependence on their habits, and it is they who prevent us from moving forward.
So if we need change, we need to start doing something new that you haven't done before. If you do not act, then you will be stuck at the zero point of reference, not moving forward. Remember: changing habits entails global changes in destiny.
Ignorance
Another obstacle in your path is ignorance. Its essence lies in the fact that a person does not perceive new information and in advance, not knowing any facts, condemns it.
As a rule, people suffering from ignorance are very sensitive to change and do not want to notice anything new. They trust no one and nothing, and the saddest thing about their situation is that they have driven themselves into a dead corner.
But they can still fix everything if they change their perception of the world around them. If you belong to this type of people, then you must fully realize that everything around you is constantly changing and moving forward. You will either have to keep up with progress, or get stuck in the past for an indefinite period of time.
Change - and the world around you, and your life will certainly change for the better!
