Self-Consciousness

Smiling and Self-Awareness

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When you increase your self-awareness, you’re much more likely to smile because you’re more balanced and happy deep inside. Many years ago I encountered a person I hadn’t met before at a workplace of mine who looked directly at me and asked why I was smiling. Her facial expression and tone of voice indicated that she wasn’t joking, she genuinely wanted to squash my smile and do it quickly.

What happens when you encounter someone who doesn’t smile much? What’s the feeling you get from them? Countless people live lives of sadness, desperation, and resignation. They’re stuck in a depressing place and can’t see the positive alternatives available to them. I’ve found over years of working with people that it’s possible to overcome negativity and move in a more joyful direction, but it requires conscious effort and dedication.

It takes a lot of self-awareness and courage to smile, especially in the face of sadness, anger, fear, or uncertainty. The reason I smile in even some of the most difficult situations is because I ask myself, “What’s the alternative?” which is, by the way, what I said to the woman.

Building up your self-awareness is like smiling, it reflects your inner light and makes the world a better place. What will you do to develop self-awareness and smile more?

Cheers,

Guy

Self-Awareness and Your Work/Life Balance

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Self-awareness means living meaningfully instead of frantically. I was coaching a highly driven, successful leader recently who told me she had a very full schedule and felt overwhelmed by the sheer amount of activity in her life. She felt empty and exhausted at the end of the day and wondered why she wasn’t happier even thought she worked so hard. After describing her situation for a while, she confided that she had been juggling so many different tasks that she was unable to take the time to look at her life meaningfully or even begin to understand what balance means.

It’s easy to get sucked into living a fast-paced life and forgetting to enjoy the journey. The key to living a happy life is to have the self-awareness to evaluate what you’re currently doing and introduce some new ideas to become more balanced. Let’s look at how reflecting, prioritizing, and relaxing can help you create balance between your professional and personal life.

It’s important to reflect on what you’re doing so you can identify what really matters to you in life. When you reflect consciously you can make adjustments that will help you feel better. It’s up to you to decide what you want to focus on in life. Do you want to work fifteen hours a day at the office or spend more time with your significant other? Will you regret taking on anther work project instead of spending more time with your kids? You have the ability to prioritize your efforts and decide which ones merit the most attention and you get to choose whether you live meaningfully. Take the time to reflect on what’s really important to you and make a conscious decision to move in a positive direction.

The next balance-increasing idea is to prioritize. If you work too much you might consider increasing the amount of time you devote to your personal life. If you don’t work enough you can make an adjustment to increase your activity level. The idea is to be somewhere in the middle between all work and all play. You don’t have to be perfectly balanced all the time, but it is more enjoyable to spend your time in the middle where you’ll feel more calm and relaxed instead of struggling with extremes.

It’s also important to relax regularly. Taking frequent breaks is beneficial to your body because is helps you replenish your energy and brain power. Although you might be able to endure arduous activity for long periods, it doesn’t necessarily mean that it is good for your body or mind. You weren’t designed to go at top speed permanently and you aren’t built to process and endless stream of overwhelming information. Relaxing means not doing anything for a period of time so you can function more effectively overall. You can relax by taking a walk, doing non-strenuous exercise, meditating or breathing mindfully. The idea is to interrupt the non-stop action going on in your life.

When you possess a high level of self-awareness you realize that life isn’t a perpetual rat race where you constantly exhaust yourself. The discomfort you feel when you’re out of balance arises because you’re missing a stable center point. Experiencing too much of anything has a tendency to marginalize the other areas of your life. To restore balance you just need to take the time to adjust your life by incorporating more of what’s missing. If you work too much, relax a little; If you are always napping, take action more often. You don’t have to do everything at once, just make small adjustments to balance things out. What will you do to find balance?

Cheers,

Guy

Self-Awareness and Choosing Your Path

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Self-awareness allows you to consciously and deliberately choose your path in life because, when you know yourself well deep inside, you’re able to manage your emotions, thoughts, and behaviors in a way that leads to success.

There are no rules as to which path you need to take in life. All you have to do is continue building self-awareness and move in a direction that makes you deeply happy and reflects your true self. That means that you get to choose what you want to do and how you want to do it based on your talents and abilities.

People hold themselves back because they choose paths in life that don’t reflect who they really are. The trick is to be self-aware enough to understand what your strengths and areas for improvement are and then plan a course of action that helps you learn and grow while making your dreams come true.

What will you do to develop self-awareness and choose the path in life that is a natural fit for you?

Cheers,

Guy

Self-Awareness and How You Treat Other People

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Many individuals walk through life missing the self-awareness to understand how their thoughts and actions impact others. One of the hallmarks of understanding yourself well is that it helps you be so happy and balanced that you treat other people well. The better you feel about yourself, the easier it is to interact positively with other human beings and create a more positive world. Here are some signs that you practice self-awareness and treat others with care and compassion:

  • You experience positive results from your interactions with others.
  • You create meaningful friendships.
  • You feel good deep inside.
  • Your relationships are reciprocally satisfying.
  • You don’t have a lot of enemies.
  • People generally say nice things about you.
  • You experience very little conflict with others.
  • Your default behaviors are kindness and empathy.

I these outcomes sound familiar, you know how wonderful it feels to like yourself and others. Life is too short to behave negatively and step on others when there are so many other more positive options. What will you do to treat others wonderfully?

Cheers,

Guy

Self-Awareness and Thinking about Others

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Perhaps you’ve met individuals who assure you they possess self-awareness and then trample all over other people. It’s like the boss who says she’s wonderful and caring and shouts at her employees or the husband who says he’s a great guy but does things that deeply hurt his spouse.

When you have a high level of self-awareness you naturally think about others. The more comfortable and knowledgeable you are about what drives your thoughts, feelings and behaviors, the more likely you will be to feel happy and balanced and treat other people in a caring, compassionate way. If you solely care about your money, your power, your own success, your immediate needs, your safety, or your own point of view, you’re less likely to think about other people.

The key to living a genuinely fulfilling, happy life is to realize that you can take care of yourself and others, not just one or the other. As you become healthier and more tuned in to who you are deep inside, you’re much more likely to help others do the same. What will you do to keep building your self-awareness and thinking about others?

Cheers,

Guy

Self-Awareness, Leadership, and Positive Thinking

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Self-awareness, leadership, and successful thinking are interlinked because leaders who understand their strengths and areas for improvement are better able to lead effectively.

Ever work for a leader who always sees the glass as half empty? What was it like? As a leader, how you wake up in the morning can make a big difference on how successful your day, your week or your entire work life is. Think about how your work day will go if you think thoughts like these:

  • Another day another dollar.
  • I hate my work.
  • I don’t want to get out of bed.
  • I hate my job.
  • I don’t feel like doing anything new.
  • I lost my slippers.
  • I wish those birds would shut up.
  • I can’t deal with my employees.
  • I won’t get any clients.

You might be better off staying in bed if you think these thoughts because they are going to lead you toward stagnation or lack of motivation and will do the same for your workplace. Think about what kind of results you might get if you increased your self-awareness and consciously thought the following:

  • I’m going to make my work meaningful.
  • I’m looking forward to the people I’ll meet today.
  • I’ve designed work activities I enjoy.
  • It’s going to be a great day.
  • I love the sound of birds chirping.
  • Nothing can stop me today.
  • My workplace is full of opportunities.
  • I love the work I do.

It may feel a little different at first, but thinking in a positive way actually leads you in a positive direction. If you think you’re going to fail, you will, if you envision success you’re more likely to create those results. How you think about your workplace will deeply affect the way your career unfolds.

How will you develop self-awareness and practice successful thinking?

Cheers,

Guy

Self-Awareness Means Possessing Emotional Intelligence

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When you’re self-aware, you’re in touch with and can manage your emotions, which means you possess emotional intelligence. People are often scared or don’t understand the concept of emotional intelligence, but it’s really just a helpful skill that can help anyone live a better life.

Emotional intelligence is the ability to deal with or manage your emotions and welcome the emotions of others. If you’re an emotionally intelligent individual, you’re comfortable with any feeling that occurs inside you, you’re able to handle it and keep your life moving in a positive direction, and you do the same when others are feeling things.

A lot of people are deeply uncomfortable with experiencing their emotions, they’ve been taught that it somehow makes them weak or vulnerable – they’re basically afraid of what will happen if they look at the things that are troubling them. The irony is that self-aware people who openly experience their emotions are happier and more courageous.

Over the years, I’ve found that people actually feel better when they learn how to deal with and manage their emotions. It’s like a weight lifts off their shoulders and they’re able to enjoy life to it’s fullest.

Emotions are a natural part of life and you can either use them to become a healthier person or let them bring you down. What will you do to develop self-awareness and emotional intelligence?

Cheers,

Guy

The Self-Awareness Guy