Awareness Meaning

Self-Aware People Listen More Than Talk

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A lot of people who lack self-awareness have been conditioned to believe that they need to talk a lot. We’ve all met a person who seems to be in love with the sound of their voice and rarely lets people into the conversation. What we sometimes forget is that communication is over 90% non-verbal which means that talking is just a small part of what we’re supposed to be doing.

Yet millions of people wake up every day ready to tell the world something rather than learning something from the world. We spend our time trying to tell our story rather than gaining more insight into others’ experiences. Think about your own style: Do you talk more or do you listen more? What would happen if you shifted your style just slightly. Self-aware people understand that getting their point across is often as much about understanding someone else’s point of view as it is putting one’s own opinion into the mix.

Here are some tips to help you add to your communication skills:

  1. Try to listen more than you talk.
  2. Ask open-ended questions.
  3. Try not to think of the next thing you’re going to say.
  4. Try not to think of the perfect rebuttal.
  5. Stay away from questions that lead the conversation in a certain direction.
  6. Let people say what they want and give them the space to do so.
  7. Listen.
  8. Did I mention listening?

The key skill we ignore in life is listening. It’s incredible what we learn when we take the time to really listen to someone. Suddenly we understand people better and can make decisions based on rich information. We avoid misunderstandings and we connect with people on a deeper level.

Perhaps the most powerful proof that listening helps improve our lives is that it allows us to breathe. We don’t have to fill up space, we don’t have to think of witty things to say and we get to learn all kinds of interesting things about others and relax more.

What will you do to develop self-awareness and listen more than talk?

Cheers,

Guy

Self-Aware People Are Deep

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Possessing self-awareness is synonymous with being a deep person, where all the meaningful parts of life reside, although most people prefer to stay in the shallow end. There’s nothing horrible about talking about the weather, sports, or cats, but I prefer to go where other people dare not: the inner workings of the mind in all its tumultuousness, ambiguity, insecurity, and pain.

I’ve always been someone who feels things very intensely, often to the point of discomfort, so it makes sense that my self-awareness work tends to reflect deeper emotions. Many people try to ignore these feelings and uncertainties, sometimes for an entire lifetime, but I figure we’re all wired to feel and we each get to choose whether we use our natural ability to emote. So many of the problems in the world could be resolved if people were willing to work out their inner turmoil before putting it on others.

Being a deep person allows you to experience life at its fullest, warts and all, but with the idea that you’ll be stronger and more balanced when you deal with your issues. When you acknowledge and feel pain, you can then do something positive to heal it.

What will you do to develop self-awareness and be a deep person?

Cheers,

Guy

Self-Awareness Means Telling Yourself the Truth

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A major element of self-awareness is telling yourself the truth about what’s going on in your life. When you do this you’re able to figure out what’s going well and what needs attention. Being truthful doesn’t mean beating yourself up, it’s just the act of acknowledging the areas you want to strengthen.

A lot of people spend their entire lives lying to themselves and doing things that don’t reflect who they really are deep inside. This leads to pain and misery for the person doing it and the people around him or her. Here are some signs you’re telling yourself the truth:

  • You know who you really are deep down inside.
  • Your words match your actions.
  • You follow your dreams.
  • You deal well with your emotions.
  • You’re not afraid of looking at the difficult issues in your upbringing and life in general.
  • You heal the parts of you that are damaged.
  • You make life easier for yourself and those around you.
  • You don’t lie about who you really are.

Cheers,

Guy

Self-Awareness and Avoiding Being Ordinary

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Self-awareness helps you avoid being ordinary so you can experience a life of courage, joy, love, enlightenment, meaning, and fulfillment. Throughout my career consulting for and training thoughtful people who are searching for answers in their lives and trying to develop self-awareness, I have noticed that there is a vast difference between conforming and blazing your own path. My experience has taught me that the goal in life isn’t to just get by or live an ordinary existence, but rather:

  • Being who you really are.
  • Doing courageous things each day to make your dreams come true.
  • Going against the grain when in the presence of injustice.
  • Thinking and behaving differently than the norm.
  • Not trying to fit in.
  • Adding to the beauty in the world.
  • Making the world a better place for as many people as possible.
  • Moving beyond high-school behaviors.
  • Becoming your own person rather than the one your parents, family, or peer group want you to be.
  • Thinking and behaving with kindness and compassion rather than self-interest.

Moving past the standard way of being requires consciously diverging from what most people do. It means having the self-awareness to be your own person and do your own thing. The underlying reason is that you get to be yourself rather than conforming to others or pretending you’re someone else, thus living a much richer, more meaningful life.

What will you do to develop self-awareness and go beyond ordinariness?

Cheers,

Guy

Self-Awareness Helps You Stop Being a Jerk

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How to stop being a jerk? Throw away what you’re currently doing and replace it with something more positive. People are jerks because they lack self-awareness and don’t know what else to do but, luckily, even the most difficult person can change their habits if they truly want to.

Here are some ideas to help you stop being a jerk:

  • Start with the idea that you’re not a bad person, just someone who got into a certain behavior pattern.
  • Realize that there is a way to do things that doesn’t involve discomfort, strife, and conflict.
  • Understand that you can actually get along with people.
  • Give yourself the gift of going to go see a professional therapist to work out the underlying issues (usually from your childhood) that have led to this point.
  • Keep working on yourself with the help of a therapist, explore changing the patterns you’ve established.
  • Learn new ways of recognizing, moderating, and applying your feelings, thoughts, and behaviors.
  • Give yourself a pat on the back for work well done.
  • Heave a sigh of relief that you can leave all the garbage behind.

Being a jerk is really about someone not knowing what else to do. Thankfully, we now have the knowledge to help people work through their issues and develop positive habits so they can enjoy life at home and at work.

What will you do to develop self-awareness and stop being a jerk?

Cheers,

Guy

Self-Aware People Change the World for the Better

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A key element of self-awareness is realizing how much power you have to change the world for the better. A single person can lift humanity out of misery or plunge it into self-destruction. One damaged individual can lead a nation into the precipice or destroy the planet. One healthy individual can help bring about hope, kindness, and healing.

The amazing thing about human beings is that we have the ability to move in any direction we want. Each day we have the opportunity to work for the common good or promote strife. I love interacting with people who value self-awareness because they understand the effect of their thoughts, words, and actions. They use their personal power to move beyond their own immediate needs to helping highlight injustices and create a better world.

If one individual can help people get along or go to war, imagine the power you wield to change anything that matters to you. What will you do to develop self-awareness and change the world for the better?

Cheers,

Guy

Self-Awareness and Success in Our Culture

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Our culture often defines success it as having a lot of money, prestige, or power. My interpretation of success is building your self-awareness so you can be in touch with who you are inside and live in such a way that you don’t need to worry about wealth or influence.

There are countless really rich and powerful people who are miserable; you can tell because they don’t treat others well. Anyone who is willing to harm other people doesn’t feel good about himself or herself deep inside. Happy, balanced, fulfilled people treat themselves and others kindly because their lives are centered around creating a positive world rather than amassing wealth or crushing others.

I love consulting for people who value self-awareness because they tend to view success in terms of how healthy they are, not how much stuff they have or trophies they display on the mantle. Even if you don’t make a penny, you can still create something of great value.

What will you do to develop self-awareness and be meaningfully successful?

Cheers,

Guy

The Self-Awareness Guy