Self and Self-Awareness

How to Be Happy? Self-Awareness - On Developing Self-Awareness and Being Self-Aware

How to Be Happy? Self-Awareness

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My clients frequently ask me how to be happy. Over the years I’ve noticed that a common characteristic of people who are happy is having a strong awareness of who we are and where we are going. Self-awareness is a deep understanding of who we are. It literally impacts how we treat ourselves and others and what kind of life we live. Let me give you a real world example to illustrate how important it is to get to know yourself.

Person A says he is a happy go lucky person that always is having a great time. He has a lot of friends and says he’s confident and an optimist. He lives a life that looks great to everyone on the outside but, when he has to think about it, Person A is deeply unhappy. He has unresolved issues in his life that are so difficult that he refuses to look at them. So person A appears happy on the outside but inside he is constantly struggling to ignore and cast aside the demons he carries. This type of person is not living a life of self-awareness because he won’t even begin the process of understanding who he is in order to move forward. He chooses instead to live a live of superficial happiness based on appearances.

Person B, on the other hand, also has issues that hurt him deeply and made him unhappy. He also appears happy to the outside world but his happiness comes from a very different place. Person B decided years ago to look at the things that brought him pain. He worked very hard to acknowledge his past and create a plan to move beyond the hurt. When person B is alone he feels genuinely happy because he has actually moved past the challenges in his past. This type of happiness is far more genuine because the person has literally worked through the things that made them unhappy. His happiness is real because it’s based on his deep self-awareness based on facing his hurts.

Genuine happiness comes from deep inside us. It is a level of existence that we achieve only when we work through the challenges from our past. I’m not suggesting that we live in the past but rather that we acknowledge the things that hurt us earlier in life and then develop a plan to move forward. People get caught up in the idea that they have to live in pain if they look at the difficult issues in their life when it really provides an opportunity to go beyond those issues and grow in positive ways. Imagine your life without those nagging things that hold you back. Think about how successful you would be if you didn’t have those voices trying to keep you from succeeding.

Everyone deserves to live a happy life, one where we’re genuinely fulfilled and content. Those who are truly happy have left the burdens of the past behind. Think about it as the difference between living your life with the burden of carrying a giant monkey on your back and never getting rid of it versus letting it go and living a much lighter and energized existence. You will truly enjoy living from a place of authentic happiness free from the worries of the past. It is achievable for everyone but it takes conscious effort and work. Once you do the work the rewards are amazing.

Self-awareness is not about being selfish or self-indulgent, it’s about understanding who you are and constantly working on becoming the best person you can be. You get to be the best you possible and you get to live a life of fulfillment rather than just getting by. Those who choose to be aware of whom they really are enjoy the benefits of living a genuinely happy life.

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

Cheers,

Guy

Self-Awareness and Trusting Your Inner Voice - On Developing Self-Awareness and Being Self-Aware

Self-Awareness and Trusting Your Inner Voice

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Nothing is a beautiful as the voice inside you. Pay attention to it and you’ll live a life of great self-awareness, success and happiness. Ignore it and you’ll move in a very different direction. Your inner voice is that part of you that tells you what you really want to do in life and who you are deep inside.

Self-awareness means paying attention to your inner voice as it guides you toward living authentically and making your dreams come true. Here are some questions you can ask yourself to begin discovering your true path:

  1. If I could choose any career in life what would it be?
  2. What is the talent I possess that I could use to bring joy into my life?
  3. What message(s) is my inner voice sending me?
  4. How would my life be different if I listened to my inner voice?
  5. What will I commit to doing today to achieve what my inner voice tells me to?

As you answer these questions you’ll begin thinking more deeply about the things you find meaningful and fulfilling. Imagine living your life based on what you want to do rather than settling for whatever comes your way or what other people tell you to do. What will you do to listen to your inner voice?

Cheers,

Guy

Self-Awareness and Moving Your Life in the Direction You Choose - On Developing Self-Awareness and Being Self-Aware

Self-Awareness and Moving Your Life in the Direction You Choose

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A big part of self-awareness is knowing yourself well enough to consciously move your life in any direction you choose. The way you behave each day predicts the results you will get, whether you succeed or stagnate. Here are some practical things you can do to start your journey:

1. Focus on the thing you want to happen, this is your goal.
2. Determine three actions you can take to achieve that specific goal.
3. Pick one action and start following through on it today.
4. When you’ve achieved one goal, move on to the next.
5. Take time to celebrate yourself and your accomplishment.

The purposeful act of following through and taking action trains your mind to take on challenges. When you achieve a goal it gives you strength and courage to keep moving forward in life, you begin to see the power you have over your circumstances, and it also increases your self-awareness.

The key to success in life is going from the thinking phase to the doing part. Try working through the five steps we’ve outlined and keep doing it until you succeed. Along the way you will be practicing the skills necessary to move your life in any direction you choose.

What will you do to develop self-awareness and move your life forward positively?

Cheers,

Guy

Self-Aware People Realize Things Can't Make Them Happy - On Developing Self-Awareness and Being Self-Aware

Self-Aware People Realize Things Can’t Make Them Happy

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I frequently consult with people who lack self-awareness and genuinely believe that buying things will make them happy. Time after time they realize that buying stuff really doesn’t affect their long term happiness. Sure, there is a buzz that comes from buying something you like but it doesn’t resolve the underlying things that are vital to fulfillment. This doesn’t mean that you can’t be happy buying things, it just requires that you put some thought into why you buy stuff. If you buy objects with the hopes of feeling better about yourself, I have some basic questions you can ask yourself to build self-awareness and help you focus on what’s really going on.

1. Do I really need this object?
2. How am I focusing on fixing the deeper issues in my life?
3. Do I feel less whole when I can’t shop?
4. In what ways does buying things affect my emotions?
5. Does shopping help me postpone feeling emotions?
6. Do I hide the fact that I buy stuff from others?
7. Do I have to buy other stuff to keep the buzz going?
8. In what other areas of my life could I devote more energy and thought?
9. Could my money be used for long-term success?
10. How am I defined by my things?

The answers to these questions will help you get some perspective on how your buying habits affect your life. There’s nothing wrong or horrible with buying nice things unless it prevents you from looking at the deeper stuff in life.

What will you do to develop self-awareness and be happy from sources other than buying things?

Cheers,

Guy

Self-Awareness Helps You Do What You Love in Life - On Developing Self-Awareness and Being Self-Aware

Self-Awareness Helps You Do What You Love in Life

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Self-awareness helps you do what you love in life because, when you comprehend why you feel, think, and behave the way you do, you’re able to identify a meaningful path and live authentically.

It’s really normal to want to figure out what you really want to do in life. It’s much more fulfilling to do things you love than things you have to do. Much of the discomfort you feel comes from not following your true path.

When I consult with people, we frequently talk about how they can tell if they are following their path. The answer varies from person to person but I’ve found that people just feel better, happier, stronger, more motivated and productive when they build self-awareness and do things they love. It’s the feeling you get when you’re doing things you actually enjoy doing rather than things that bring you discomfort. Think of the millions of people toiling in jobs they hate because they haven’t yet connected with what they really want to do. What would their lives look like if they incorporated more of the activities that bring them joy?

Think about the following questions in order to figure out what you want to do with your life:

  1. What do I love doing more than anything?
  2. Am I doing that thing?
  3. What am I doing to pursue my dreams in general?
  4. Am I settling for a life that does not include my dreams?
  5. What am I afraid of?
  6. What specific action can I take today to move toward my dreams?

You deserve to live a great life and you have the power to move toward your goals and dreams at any moment you choose to. Doing what you love isn’t automatic, it requires conscious thought and persistence. The good news is that you can do concrete things to move in any direction you want. Start today and you could be on your way to doing the things you’ve always dreamed of.

What will you do to develop self-awareness and do what you love in life?

Cheers,

Guy

Self-Awareness and Regaining Hope - On Developing Self-Awareness and Being Self-Aware

Self-Awareness and Regaining Hope

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Self-awareness helps you regain hope because, when you understand why you feel, think, and behave the way you do, you are able to move your life in a positive direction and move past the barriers that used to hold you back.

Many of us reach points in our lives where we feel like nothing is going right. I ask people to continue building self-awareness and focus on the things that are going right. It may sound simplistic but much of how we see the world is based on perspective.

Why is it that one person sees an event as a tragedy while another sees it simply as a bump in the road? Perspective. Why is it that one person crumbles when faced with adversity but others thrive? Perspective.

When you give up hope you give up believing that you can affect the world around you. This is only a perception because, in fact, you can always do something to move your life in a different direction. Try these simple techniques to overcome the challenges in your life.

1. Take an inventory of the things you do well.
2. Pick one of the things you came up with to work on.
3. Take steps to finish the work.
4. Move on to the next thing you want to do.

Regaining hope is often about finding your inner confidence. You reconnect to your inner hope and confidence by actually doing things and experiencing the challenge of completing tasks. Doing things literally impels you to do something besides dwell on your loss of hope. Try these steps and move in a direction that satisfies you. You deserve it.

What will you do to develop self-awareness and live hopefully?

Cheers,

Guy

How to Resolve Conflicts with Self-Awareness - On Developing Self-Awareness and Being Self-Aware

How to Resolve Conflicts with Self-Awareness

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People who lack self-awareness often ask me how to resolve conflicts. Many individuals think that letting conflict build up, followed by an explosion, followed by another build-up period is the natural cycle of conflict. The only difficulty with this approach is that the conflict continues and doesn’t get resolved. The only real solution is to increase self-awareness and fix the conflict by taking action. Follow the following steps to begin working on resolving rather than perpetuating conflict.

1. Each person identifies what the they think the conflict is.
2. Both people agree together on one definition of the conflict to begin resolving.
3. Each person comes up with two or three possible solutions.
4. Both people agree together on which solution to implement.
5. If the parties can’t work together find a mediator.

Resolving conflict is about having the self-awareness to work with the other person to actually fix the situation. The act of doing all the previous steps (always in order) allows us the chance to work with the other person rather than against them. Make sure you start at the first step and do not progress to the next if you haven’t finished the previous step. We are conditioned to rush to solutions but frequently forget that it the working through the issue that gets us the most permanent and satisfactory results.

What will you do to develop self-awareness and actually resolve conflicts?

Cheers,

Guy

The Self-Awareness Guy