The Self-Awareness Guy, Author at The Self-Awareness Guy

Self-Awareness and Family Functioning

January 27, 2023 - The Self-Awareness Guy

Self-awareness is a major component of healthy family functioning because, the more people understand themselves, the easier it will be for them to get along with each other and interact positively. We’ve been led to believe that families are about order, control, hierarchy, respect, tradition and other words that put people in boxes rather than encourage them to be themselves and live joyfully. People in restrictive families are often asked to do things like:

Keep secrets.
Sublimate their own identity to fit the group.
Follow rules, no matter how unreasonable or arbitrary.
Be in constant conflict and call it love.
Occasionally do nice things for each other.
Have no effective problem-solving or conflict resolution mechanisms.
Talk only about approved subjects.
Blindly defer to people who may not know what they’re doing.
Only express approved emotions.
Negative behaviors are tolerated.

These types of actions are common in many families but don’t lead to celebrating individuals and helping them discover who they really are deep inside. When family members possess a high level of self-awareness they likely promote behaviors such as:

Talking openly about difficult subjects.
Building one’s own identify and being accepted.
Worrying less about rules and more about critical thinking.
Treating each other with kindness and empathy.
Consistently doing nice things for each other.
Understanding how to fix problems and resolve conflicts.
All conversation topics are valid and important.
Everyone is equal.
All emotions are welcome.
Positive behaviors are the norm.

There is a vast difference between the type of interactions that result from the first list and the second. The higher your level of self-awareness is, the more likely you are to move away from power and control to encouraging everyone to be his or her amazing self without restrictions or conditions. What will you do to improve your family functioning?

Cheers,
Guy

Self-Aware People Are Kind, Sensitive, and Creative

January 27, 2023 - The Self-Awareness Guy

I love connecting with kind, sensitive, creative people who value self-awareness because they tend to spread positive vibes that help build a happier, more compassionate and enlightened world.

So, why would anyone want to be this type of person? Because it leads to greater joy and fulfillment. Kindness means behaving in a way that demonstrates empathy and care for something or someone else. It’s a peaceful state of being that creates harmony. Sensitivity means dealing positively with your own feelings and being attuned to others’ emotions as well. Creativity means that you have the courage to think differently and challenge conventions. When you mix these three qualities you have a person who possesses self-awareness and is able to live a deeply satisfying, positive life and have a beneficial impact on his or her environment.

Imagine a world where people treat each other with kindness, are sensitive to their own and each other’s feelings, and create beautiful things. It’s a very different state of being than what we’ve been led to believe is the way things should be (competitions, strife, jealousy, brokenness). Having self-awareness means that you’re able to rise above pettiness and self-centeredness and behave in ways that benefit the greater good.

What will you do to practice self-awareness and be a kind, sensitive, creative person?

Cheers,

Guy

Self-Awareness and Seeing the Big Picture

January 27, 2023 - The Self-Awareness Guy

A lot of people think that working on their self-awareness is a selfish pursuit but they may be missing the point. When you deeply understand why you think or act the way you do, you move from being someone who lives unconsciously to someone who understands the implications surrounding their thoughts and behaviors. For example: If you get mad at friends or family all the time, you’re behaving in a way that is specific and limited, whereas if you take the time to think about what you’re doing and how you can move in a positive direction, you increase your ability to see things from a wider perspective.

You can choose to live life based only on what you think, feel and do in the moment but you’ll be much happier and fulfilled if you pause and think about all the other options available to you. What will you do to use your self-awareness to see the big picture?

Take care

Guy

Self-Awareness Helps Get Rid of Bigotry

January 26, 2023 - The Self-Awareness Guy

Bigotry is about as far away from self-awareness as you can get. It means living a closed, scared, reactive life that doesn’t do anybody any good, including the person being a bigot. I thought I’d write on this difficult subject because I really care about people being able to love themselves and others. There is a lot of hurt in our world and there are countless valuable individuals who are literally living in fear, pain, and rage instead of enjoying their time on this earth. I hope this article will help someone out there feel better about himself or herself and decide to live a life of joy. To start off, here are fifteen ways to tell you’re a bigot:

You can’t stand when someone disagrees with your beliefs or views.
You get angry or violent toward people who aren’t like you.
You live constantly angry at other people.
You have difficulty being vulnerable around other people and are trying to keep them from seeing the real you and hurting you.
You hate people who are different from you.
You prejudge people before you get to know them.
You hate people because of any number of things including how they look, talk, dress, worship (or not), or any other number of reasons.
Only your opinions matter.
You have difficulty accepting everyone.
You feel powerless inside and act super tough to cover for it, or try to take away other people’s power.
You feel threatened by others.
You have seen people give you a scared look when you tell them about your views.
You believe in striking first before they strike at you.
Conflict seems to find you.
You don’t ever really feel happy inside, even if you say you are.

The reason this subject means so much to me is that I’ve personally seen so many wonderful people give their lives away to hate and toxicity. They go from being human beings full of potential to angry creatures who hurt others. The good news about bigotry is that it’s not a lifelong commitment, you can choose to move in a more positive direction at any time by doing things like:

Building self-awareness by understanding where your emotions, thoughts, and behaviors come.
Healing the hurts from your childhood.
Living a life of love and compassion.
Getting to know as many different kinds of people as possible and enjoying everything they have to offer.
Realizing how great life is when you’re free of fear or hate.
Understanding how much you matter and how important it is for you to find what makes you happy deep inside instead of living a life where you’re constantly getting angry at outside things.
Having the courage to go see a therapist to help you along the way.
Surrounding yourself with people who are soft, kind, compassionate, caring, accepting, and who will value the new you.
Taking action to do nice things for others every day.
Resolving to help build a better world for everyone.
Doing the things you really love in life.
Discovering the real you and celebrating yourself.

Look at both these lists and honestly ask yourself which one might feel better. In my experience, its the path of love and kindness that always leads to better results. It will take a lot of work to shift your old emotions, thoughts, and behaviors but the reward is that you’ll get to live a life of self-awareness, peace, and happiness. I wish you all the best on your journey, I know you can do it.

What will you do to develop self-awareness and move past bigotry?

Cheers,

Guy

Self-Awareness and Reducing Family Conflict

January 26, 2023 - The Self-Awareness Guy

Self-awareness can help reduce family conflict because, when people understand themselves well, they are better able to work things out with others.

Conflict can be especially painful when it involves family. My clients often ask me what to do about a family member who they can’t get along with. It can be tricky to deal with family because there are often rules we are expected to follow in our families.

It’s common to feel a sense of duty toward family but that doesn’t give people a free pass to hurt each other. Ideally we treat everyone with the same dignity and respect whether they are family or not.

Here are a few ideas to help you build self-awareness and set boundaries with your family:

1. Respect your needs and beliefs first.
2. Inform your family about what you want. Set limits and boundaries.
3. Inform your family you are available to work things out.
4. Work with them to resolve the conflict.
5. Set the example for how you want to be treated.
6. Take some time away if things get heated.
7. Expect resistance.

You are your own unique person regardless of what your family says or does. It’s ultimately healthiest to pay attention to the things that bring you joy and happiness than to try to mold yourself into someone else’s vision. Trust yourself and teach your family who you are. Do it with kindness and patience and eventually they will understand who you are.

What will you do to develop self-awareness and reduce conflict in your family?

Cheers,

Guy

12 Obstacles to Building Self-Awareness

January 26, 2023 - The Self-Awareness Guy

Many intelligent and accomplished people don’t realize that self-awareness can help them enjoy deeply fulfilling and meaningful lives. They think that self-awareness is some touchy-feely nuisance that doesn’t yield tangible results. Self-awareness is a key part of being happy and living a fulfilling life because, when you understand yourself well, you experience the world as the real you rather than living unconsciously or based on what others expect you to do. Here are twelve obstacles to building self-awareness:

Fear of unpleasant emotions.
Fear of opening a pandora’s box of memories.
It’s easier to live unconsciously.
It’s easier to live through other people than to take the risks involved with living a genuine life.
It’s easier to give the responsibility for your happiness or success to someone or something else.
Self-awareness takes a lot of work.
It’s difficult to break habits.
People are comfortable doing what they’ve always done, even if it’s not working.
Self-awareness isn’t tangible like building something or making money.
People don’t see the value in getting to know themselves.
People feel uncomfortable focusing on themselves.
Fear of trying something new.

Building self-awareness isn’t some abstract concept that only works in books. When you get to know yourself better, you live a happier life because you understand understand why you do the things you do. The ultimate goal of self-awareness is to know yourself so well that you’re comfortable living as the real you.

Cheers,

Guy

Self-Awareness and Fixing a Family Problem

January 25, 2023 - The Self-Awareness Guy

Self-awareness can help you fix a family problem because, when you understand how everyone’s emotions, thoughts, and actions, affect each other, then you’re able to work on solutions to even the most difficult situations.

For much of history we have viewed the family as a unit that helped us
with survival. We depended on each other because there was strength and
security in numbers. Recent developments in society and technology have
allowed us to experience the family differently than we used to. We now
are able to work on making our families as healthy as possible—a
concept that our ancestors never even contemplated.

With this new ability to improve the health of our families comes a great
opportunity to enjoy our family relationships like never before. We
also get to face challenges in new ways. In the past we let conflict
fester and continue throughout our lives. We didn’t have the tools to
actually fix things. Now we do and consulting gives families some tools
they can use to increase the happiness in their homes.

Some basic things you can think about when a family problem arises include:

What is the problem really about?
Do you know what each family member thinks about the problem?
Have you all worked together to come up with possible solutions?
Is everyone’s voice listened to and given equal weight?
Does everyone know how to listen to other points of view?
Can people deal with conflict without escalating?
Is conflict an opportunity for change in your family?
How are your communication skills?
Do you have a consistent system for resolving problems in the family?
Do you ask for neutral help or advice from uninvolved third parties?

Resolving problems in the family has a lot to do with the skills and experiences we bring to the table. A lot of us repeat the patterns we saw at home but we now have the benefit of new strategies to actually resolve
problems rather than perpetuating them. Consider some of the following
ideas to help your family increase self-awareness and move forward positively:

Develop a conflict resolution strategy.
Develop communication skills.
Develop listening skills.
Work together.

It’s amazing how those four basic elements can help families resolve
problems. Most of our families are not set up to fix problems, just
make them go away temporarily. I enjoy consulting for parents to create
new ways of actually fixing problems in the family, so everyone involved can feel included and valued.

What will you do to develop self-awareness and fix the problems in your family?

Cheers,

Guy