As humans, we are exceptional and beautiful creations. We have been built with incredible promise. The saddest thing in life is to waste your talents and abilities. It almost always brings me to tears (happy tears) when I see somebody overcome massive obstacles to achieve a goal that is important to them. Want to improve yourself? This article is for you. And why it matters.
Self-improvement is a journey undertaken by yourself to improve upon any area of your life that you have decided needs work. These refinements range from improvements in your mental, physical, and spiritual being to daily concepts like improvements in your work and family.
Watching young children grow and learn, seemingly learning something new almost daily, is a beautiful and privileged gift in life. Children don’t need to go to personal growth conferences. Continual improvement is built and wired into all of us from birth. Why, as we get older, do most of us settle at a particular station in life?
Ways to start taking action
In this proverb, we are warned about how a lack of action will affect our lives. In extreme cases, sitting around will lead to scarcity and poverty. Action (practiced consistently) will improve the quality of your life. The difficult question is, what action?
Careful with the time you spend relaxing
Have you ever noticed how some elderly couples or people who have retired and stopped working go through a relatively quick change?
I have seen how some start complaining about almost everything in just a few months of inactivity.
Even minor issues are blown up into significant problems. They spend too much time watching & talking about what their neighbors are doing. Tasks like taking dustbins out or cleaning dishes become major events and must be done in a particular order.
They often need sleeping tablets; some are even on medication for mild depression just a few months into retirement. It’s almost as if they have lost the joy of living.
Even if they have no financial concerns, they seemingly lose the ability to see the beauty in life.
Contrast that with older adults of the same age who carry on working. Some have had to start a small business as they can’t work for the same company anymore. Some help out at feeding schemes, at their churches, and get very involved with grandkids or similar. These people have a very different outlook on life. A different attitude. They also seem to enjoy their day.
They have a better quality of life.
This group has adapted and learned new expertise, like running their own business. One of the best ways to improve your life seems to be taking daily disciplined action, learning a new skill or two, working hard, and getting feedback from others through daily interaction with people.
Working towards understanding what you want
If you want to achieve more or improve yourself, instituting new habits and taking action is the first step. I would go one step further and say that deep diving into what you want from life is even more critical.
Once you have a vision of where you want to be and what improvements you want to make, taking action or learning whatever needs to be learned becomes easier. Start writing down what changes you would like to make in your life. What life goals are important? Where do you want to grow in life?
We then need to develop a plan.
Improve your life with a plan
Envisage what improvements are important to you. Five years from now, what does your life look like? Write this down. Then ask yourself if you could achieve these goals in five years, what needs to be completed by the end of year one?
At the end of year one, you need to have laid the foundations to achieve the five-year plan. Look at the list you wrote down for the end of year one. What one item on that list is the most important? What one thing jumps out at you, the most crucial change or skill that needs to be attained one year from now?
Now, focus everything on achieving this one thing. Maybe it is learning a language, finishing and passing some online courses, improving your skills in selling, running a marathon, or learning a software programming course. Whatever it is, this is your north star. This self-improvement plan is a straightforward way to help you become your best. It will direct your attention to what must be achieved daily to accomplish your bigger goals.
Next, you need to plan how to make changes in your day, no matter how small, to achieve this one-year goal. Break it down into daily disciplines and daily actions you need to achieve.
Focus on improving yourself by focusing on small daily disciplines.
Learn a new daily habit for your self-improvement
Self-awareness and living in an intentional way each day will inevitably lead to an improved you. If you want to improve and become a better person, input new daily disciplines into your life.
Once action is taken, you will immediately start feeling empowered and happier. Knowing you are on your way to achieving your goals, knowing you have found ways to grow and improve, will make a massive difference to your daily outlook.
You will be on your way to living life to the fullest. Knowing what you want and taking the necessary steps to achieve what you envision for yourself is golden. When you start hitting some of the goals you have set for yourself, these daily disciplines will become easy. You will start becoming a different person.
These small positive changes you make every day are the answer to self-improvement. You will find that you can improve your productivity without even thinking about it. This is one of the best ways to grow, to help you improve. Whether you want to learn a new language, a new hobby, develop an exercise routine, improve your fitness, or whatever improvement you seek, small daily disciplines are what are required. Practiced each and every day.
Start working on self-improvement with new daily habits
If you want to be better at something, whether it’s controlling your fear of public speaking or losing the weight you put on after pregnancy, a series of small daily & repetitive actions need to be put into your daily planner.
Make these actions small and really easy to achieve. Often, we may be scared that we will fail, so we don’t even try. The fear of failure is a liar; don’t believe that nonsense. Start really small, and make the new action so easy that you can achieve it even on a bad day. I’m a big fan of James Clear as he has some great ways to start new and powerful habits. He is an awesome resource and a great way to learn techniques to form your habits.
Slowly, over time, you will naturally learn how to improve your daily actions. If you stick with it, you will not only improve your mental health, but you will see that you will live your best life in time. Your best self will come to the fore. The time you spend developing these daily disciplines and your daily steps will increase your chances of success.
The daily disciplines will help you stay focussed on this personal development journey.
Daily disciplines, practiced consistently, will help you learn and improve. You will have a better understanding of what you are capable of with these small daily and simple self-improvement practices.
Develop yourself by learning to get rid of bad habits
When you begin working on self-improvement, trying to improve who you are can be easily diverted if you keep old harmful habits.
Self improvement and all positive aspects of your life can be derailed by the bad habits you keep. If you live your life with the attitude that keeping a few bad habits won’t harm you, you would be wrong.
If you start a self-development plan, say learning some software programming language, but you still watch TV late into the night, spend hours scrolling through social media, or keep eating a terrible diet. Soon, you won’t have the energy to put the extra hours into studying. All daily actions affect each other. Journaling is a great way to write down what may be holding you back.
At least then, you can pinpoint what is harmful and needs to be adjusted to accomplish your goals.
Start working hard
Becoming your best will mean taking control of all aspects of your day. Eating a balanced diet, getting enough sleep, exercising, etc., are all practical ways of working smarter. These are the practical self-improvement tips that will help you achieve the daily tasks you need to smash out each day.
You’ll also find you’ll have time and energy to help you gain the upper hand each day if you cut out habits that aren’t serving you.
Learn about the benefits of personal growth
As mentioned earlier, sometimes we are afraid of failure so we don’t even try. One of the practical ways to start working smarter is to make these new daily disciplines really easy to achieve as discussed above. If you can see yourself doing the discipline easily, you wont be so afraid of failure.
We also need to learn to let go of the past. There is not one person alive that hasn’t messed up multiple times. Bettering yourself can help change your outlook on who you are. Let go of past mistakes, today is a new day. Tomorrow can be a new you if you take control today.
Once you hit even a few small goals you have set for yourself, it will increase your confidence going forward.
Conclusion
It is almost like a snowball. It is hard initially, but we both know it will get easier. Small daily disciplines you have consciously slipped into every day is the best self-improvement technique.
As Jim Rohn says, it’s not what you achieve that is really the important measure, but what you become in the process.
You can improve your quality of life.
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