Self-Knowledge

Self-Awareness and Being Balanced

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I was talking to a highly accomplished leader today who had the self-awareness to realize he was feeling overwhelmed from juggling multiple projects and tasks and not allotting time for activities that would provide him more balance. His story is the same as countless other leaders trying to make sense of their work or personal lives.

You can become so engrossed in living at a rapid pace that you forget you can enjoy life more if you pause occasionally to relax, recharge and reflect. Take some time during your day to not do anything. Look at a sunset, sit by a stream, go walking in the city with no particular goal. Life becomes more enjoyable when you take time to regain your balance.

A big part of building self-awareness is the ability to monitor how you’re thinking, feeling and behaving and knowing when you need to shift direction a bit. Balance helps you maintain a positive course because it keeps you grounded and focused on the bigger picture. You’ll always experience highs and lows but, if you nurture the middle, you’ll be able to deal with anything that comes your way. What will you do to create balance in your life?

Cheers,

Guy

Self-Awareness and How to Be Successful in Life

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How to be successful in life? Practice self-awareness by deciding what you genuinely want to do deep down inside and then start taking action. Here are five steps you can take to create success in your life:

1. Think of what you want to happen.

2. Think of three things you can do to achieve that goal.

3. Pick one thing to take action on and start doing it today.

4. Check in with yourself to see how you’re progressing.

5. When you’ve finished one goal, move on to the next.

The purposeful act of choosing to do something and then following through literally builds self-awareness and trains your mind to take on challenges. When you achieve any goal it opens up great possibilities because you begin to understand that you really can impact your work life in significant ways.

Any shift in your work life begins with a conscious desire to accomplish something. The key to success is going from the abstract thought phase to actually taking action and doing something. Try these steps today on any goal you want to achieve and follow through until you generate results. Along the way you will be learning, growing, and increasing your chances of success.

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

Cheers,

Guy

The Beauty Arising from Self-Awareness

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When you lack self-awareness you’re more likely to live in a confusing, contradictory, uncertain world where things don’t make sense and beauty is less prevalent. Countless people live this way and pretend it’s normal rather than seeking a more fulfilling, balanced existence. You can choose to move toward inner and outer beauty or away from it, as in the following examples.

If you don’t possess self-awareness you:

  • Lack self-knowledge.
  • Live an inauthentic life.
  • Experience a lot of cognitive dissonance.
  • Have various parts of your mind not talking to each other.
  • Live unconsciously, reacting to your environment.
  • Are not in touch with your feelings.
  • Are superficially happy.
  • Miss much of the beauty in the world around you and inside you.

If you possess a high level of self-awareness you:

  • Understand yourself in a healthy way.
  • Live life based on your innate talents, passions and interests.
  • Think and behave in consistently positive ways.
  • Have the various parts of your mind in sync.
  • Live consciously, deliberately and mindfully.
  • Are in touch with your feelings.
  • Are deeply happy due to living meaningfully.
  • Live a life of inner and outer beauty.

Each day you have the ability to choose where your thoughts and actions will take you. Beauty is all around you as well as inside you, it’s up to you whether you access it. What will you do to celebrate the beauty in your life?

Cheers,

Guy

Self-Awareness and Your True Path

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As you increase your self-awareness you’ll naturally follow your true path in life rather than:

  • Pretending you love doing something you don’t.
  • Justifying doing things you really don’t find meaningful.
  • Doing things solely for money.
  • Doing something because you sort of like it.
  • Doing something because you can.
  • Following other people’s visions.

The more deeply you know and understand yourself, the more you’ll:

  • Do things you genuinely love.
  • Do what you really want to do and find meaningful.
  • Worry less about money and more about fulfillment.
  • Do things because you’re passionate about them.
  • Do things because they’re your calling.
  • Follow your own inner compass.

The key to living an authentic and fulfilling life is to be the real you rather than pretending to be someone else. Take the time to discover who you are and let your authentic self guide your thoughts, feelings and actions. What will you do to follow your true path?

Cheers,

Guy

self-awareness consulting

25 Characteristics of a Self-Aware Person

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Here are twenty-five characteristics of a self-aware person:

  1. You’re able to look inside yourself.
  2. You understand how your thoughts and behaviors affect you and the people around you.
  3. You’re able to manage your emotions and comfortably deal with other people’s emotions.
  4. You don’t walk through life hurting others.
  5. You treat yourself and others well.
  6. You’re generally happy and balanced.
  7. You live a meaningful and fulfilling life.
  8. You know who you are deep inside.
  9. You follow your dreams.
  10. You listen to your inner voice.
  11. You build healthy relationships.
  12. You don’t get into a lot of conflicts.
  13. You don’t try to control other people.
  14. You behave with kindness and empathy.
  15. You don’t feel you have to win or beat people.
  16. You heal your inner damage.
  17. You derive your self-esteem from being a healthy person.
  18. You listen to other people.
  19. You don’t feel threatened by new or different ideas.
  20. You live based on reality.
  21. You give to others.
  22. You don’t have an inflated ego.
  23. You don’t make excuses for the mistakes you make.
  24. You’re willing to change.
  25. You’re a nice person.

Being self-aware means that you’ve done the work necessary to understand who you really are and fix the things that cause you or others discomfort. When you possess self-awareness, you’re in touch with your emotions, thoughts, and actions, so that you can live a life where you treat yourself and others with care and compassion and help build a better world.

Cheers,

Guy

Being Sensitive Is Self-Aware

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Individuals who lack self-awareness don’t understand their impact on others. When people say things like: “You’re too sensitive,” or “Stop being so sensitive,” I can almost guarantee that someone is in the process of being hurt in some way. It usually happens like this:

  1. Person one says something rude to person two.
  2. Person two gets upset.
  3. Person one says, “You’re too sensitive.”

Being sensitive is a good thing, it means that you’re in touch with your feelings and you’re able to express them, and that’s why it makes people who aren’t well-versed in dealing with emotions uncomfortable. Most people run screaming when they experience an uncomfortable feeling inside themselves or coming from someone else, and they’ll do anything to get away from it.

I love connecting with people who value self-awareness because they know what it’s like to experience the world through heightened emotions. It doesn’t mean they don’t use their brains, it just shows they’re extra intuitive and perceptive about their environment.

If you’re a sensitive person, that’s great. Keep experiencing your feelings and encouraging others to do the same. After all, we’re all thinking, feeling beings. What will you do to develop self-awareness and be sensitive?

Cheers,

Guy

Self-Awareness and Empathy

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Self-awareness and empathy are closely linked together because they are both part of being a happy, healthy individual. Empathy is the ability to understand another being’s situation, to walk a mile in their shoes and attempt to comprehend what they are experiencing. As you build more self-awareness in life, you become more and more comfortable with who you are as a person and you create balance and security. The better you feel about yourself, the better you treat others.

Having empathy means that you feel confident enough in yourself to put your needs on the backburner for a while and think about how others see the world. It’s the ability to step outside your head and think about what someone else is going through before you think, say or do something. What will you do to practice more empathy in your life?

Cheers,

Guy

The Self-Awareness Guy