Examples of Self-Awareness

Self-Awareness and Prioritizing

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When you’re working on developing self-awareness it’s important to prioritize. You get to decide what’s most important to you and what actions you want to take. You have a lot of power to move your life in any direction you want by choosing to work on things that will create positive results. Spend less time on minor details and focus on what really matters and you’ll be on your way to success. For example: Would you rather heal one of your inner hurts so you can be genuinely happier or do something superficial that just puts a band-aid on everything?

Prioritizing means that you get to choose what you work on and when. A big part of self-awareness is knowing yourself well enough that you can tell the difference between meaningful and superficial work. I always recommend that people work on the deeper things in life, the ones that will bring them meaning and fulfillment rather than just getting by or pretending things are okay. What will you decide to do today?

Cheers,

Guy

Self-Awareness and Retirement

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Retirement can be both an exciting and challenging time in life but you can retire with self-awareness and foresight. The key to living the next faze of your life meaningfully is to ask yourself questions like:

  • Will I continue working?
  • What is my passion in life and am I pursuing it?
  • What unresolved issues do I need to fix in my life?
  • How is my relationship with those I love?
  • What are my skills and talents?
  • What will I do with the rest of my life.
  • What brings me great joy and am I doing that?

Take a moment to think about who you really are as a person and what you want to purposefully do with your life. When I coach people, I help them clarify what they want out of life and plan for the future. I’m always amazed at the wonderful things that people can do when they follow their dreams.

As you think about retirement, try to include things you love and that have great meaning to you. Retirement can be a wonderful time to show the world who you are and leave your mark as the great person you are.

Cheers,

Guy

Self-Awareness and Perseverance

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Perseverance is one of the most important traits a person can possess and is part of self-awareness. People who are able to understand and manage their own emotions, thoughts, and actions persevere more and move past the challenges in their lives.

To me it means having the self-awareness necessary to move forward and trust my inner voice no matter what happens. Very often, talented people will stifle their work or choose a “safer” career path because of what they heard from well-meaning people as they were growing up. I’ve found it helpful to keep going in spite of any inside and outside disparagement and just do my thing.

It doesn’t take superhuman effort to keep going, simply do one small thing each day that helps you continue your journey. Keep building your self-awareness so you can continue clarifying what you really want to do in life. Repeated modest actions will eventually add up to a great body of work and deep fulfillment. How will you build up your self-awareness and keep persevering?

Cheers,

Guy

People Who Lack Self-Awareness Crave Power and Control

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There is an emptiness to power and control that many people in positions of affluence and influence experience when they increase their self-awareness and realize it doesn’t matter how much they dominate others when they themselves don’t feel balanced and happy inside.

A lot of people seek power and control even though it doesn’t provide them with deep, abiding fulfillment. Sure, it can produce temporary, superficial gratification, but that doesn’t feed the need for meaning. The only way to be truly happy in life is to have inner power and control by healing one’s hurts and being as healthy as possible toward oneself and others.

A lot of people think having power and control means subjugating or dominating others; qualities that are dramatically different from inner peace and balance. The key to living a genuinely happy life is to be so self-aware that it radiates outward and helps others grow and succeed. What will you do improve your self-awareness instead of craving power and control?

Cheers,

Guy

Leadership, Lack of Self-Awareness, and Workplace Communication

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Most leaders will tell you that communication is vital to a well-functioning workplace. Then they demonstrate their lack of self-awareness by screaming, ignoring, dominating, misunderstanding or annoying their employees. There is a huge gap between what leaders say they know about effective communication and what they actually practice. Here are five of the biggest workplace communication mistakes.

1.  Not listening. How can you gather the information you need or figure out what is going on in your workplace if you don’t listen? You can’t. Listening is the most vital skill to acquire information, promote collaboration and build trust in the workplace.

2.  Assuming you know what the other person is going to say. Cutting people off because you’ve “heard it all before” or you’re irritated is a great way to tell your employees they don’t matter. Try listening to your employees without interrupting before you decide you know what they’re talking about.

3.  Thinking of the next thing you want to say instead of what the other person is saying. Many leaders are obsessed with the next wonderful thing they’re going to say. Fight this urge by clearing your mind before and while you’re listening to your employees and focusing on understanding what they’re saying.

4.  Getting angry or upset and reacting negatively to what you’re hearing. Your employees will be much less likely to share information or ideas with you if you always fly off the handle. Communication doesn’t have to be a constant struggle. Work on controlling your own emotions so you can communicate on a deeper level with your employees.

5.  Not setting aside time to talk. Hurried conversations often end up in misunderstandings because the participants haven’t devoted the time necessary to get on the same page. Make sure your important conversations are carried out with plenty of time for each participant to understand what’s being said.

Do you recognize yourself in any of these five concepts? If so, no worries, simply make small adjustments to develop your self-awareness and move toward a more balanced communication style that will get you better results. Effective communication is about practicing positive behaviors every day, not just saying you do. What will you do to increase your self-awareness and practice effective communication?

Cheers,

Guy

Self-Awareness Helps You Choose Courage over Fear

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Self-awareness helps you choose courage over fear because life has a way of creating challenging situations whether you want them or not. When these difficult circumstances present themselves you have a choice as to whether you think and behave based on fear or courage. Each approach leads you in a different direction and only one helps you live a more balanced, happy life. Lets look at a few examples of the difference between the two:

Fear: I’ve always done it this way.
Courage: I can try something new.

Fear: I hate change.
Courage: I see change as an opportunity.

Fear: That issue is too daunting and complex.
Courage: I can resolve the issue little by little.

Fear: I need to control everything and everyone around me.
Courage: I’m fine with letting go of control.

Fear: That’s unfamiliar and strange.
Courage: I can learn something from it.

Fear: Self-awareness is for people who eat granola.
Courage: I’m willing to learn about myself and others.

Living in fear limits your opportunities while thinking and acting with courage helps you deal with any situation that comes your way. The idea in life is to think and behave in ways that help you be more flexible and resilient, not less. What will you do to develop self-awareness so you can choose courage over fear?

Cheers,

Guy

Self-Awareness Can Help You Practice Effective Team Building

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A lot of leaders and organizations want to practice effective team building but don’t have the self-awareness to actually do it. I often hear people in workplaces saying things out loud that illustrate why they aren’t building teams, but they’re not aware they’re doing it. People have beliefs hardwired inside them that they don’t even realize get in the way of bringing employees together and encouraging them to collaborate. Here are ten of the most prevalent beliefs that show a lack of self-awareness and that block team building.

  1. They’ll never get along. If you believe people won’t get along they’ll prove you right almost every time.
  2. We’re rugged individualists. Individuals functioning in this way aren’t as adept at working in teams as people who believe in collaboration.
  3. If you want it done right do it yourself. If you’re doing everything it leaves your team stranded and feeling like they can’t do anything right.
  4. Teams must have a strong leader. It’s often the strong leader that gets in the way of everyone having a voice and participating actively.
  5. Collaboration was fine in kindergarten but this is the real world. If you believe this then I know how you practice team building.
  6. Everybody has a specific job. This keeps people firmly in their boxes and discourages creativity.
  7. Team building is secondary to productivity. Many leaders overlook the idea that if you build a strong foundation of high-functioning teams you become more productive.
  8. Team building is too touchy-feely. Leaders who believe this create workplaces that only allow three feelings: forced happiness, fear and anger.
  9. I don’t have to participate. Nothing says you lack commitment to team building than not participating in it with your employees.
  10. I don’t have time for team building. This is like saying you don’t have time to build a roof over your building because you’ve got to get to work and then it rains and soaks everything.

Self-aware leaders understand that team building is a vital building block to create workplaces where people interact positively and help each other get things done. The way you actually build teams is to have the self-awareness to objectively review and understand the team building strengths and areas for improvement in your workplace and take action in small increments over time. You might offer ongoing team building training or provide opportunities for people to work together to solve problems. Some organizations form brainstorming groups that tackle thorny issues. The idea is to gradually build a workplace where working collaboratively is encouraged. What will you do to create a culture of self-awareness and team building in your organization?

Cheers,

Guy

The Self-Awareness Guy