Self-Consciousness

Self-Aware Guys Are Nice and Finish First - On Developing Self-Awareness and Being Self-Aware

Self-Aware Guys Are Nice and Finish First

/ / Self and Self-Awareness, Self-Awareness, Self-Consciousness / , , ,

If you’ve ever heard the tired old saying that nice guys finish last, and believed it, then you might be surprised to find out that it’s profoundly wrong. For some unhealthy reason, our culture has decided that being self-aware and nice is an awful thing and that aggressive jerks are much happier. We’ve also convinced ourselves that whoever amasses the most stuff is naturally the winner. Perspectives like these ignore the things that really bring joy to people’s lives:

  • Possessing self-awareness.
  • Working through one’s unresolved issues.
  • Being comfortable with one’s emotions.
  • Treating people with kindness and empathy.
  • Doing things that make the world a better place for everyone.
  • Caring for the vulnerable.
  • Letting go of the need to win.
  • Not having to be on top of someone else to feel good about oneself.
  • Building positive relationships.
  • Helping everyone succeed.

No amount of money, power, or material possessions can make someone meaningfully happy. As you’ve probably read time after time, many extremely wealthy and powerful people are as miserable as can be, they just have a lot of stuff. They sit surrounded by their extravagant things in their expensive houses and have to work that much harder to convince themselves that it all means anything important.

Finishing first in life means that you’ve achieved the pinnacle of self-awareness where you are so healthy and comfortable with yourself that you spread peace and joy within yourself and throughout the world. The only things that really matter in life are how you feel deep inside about yourself, how well you treat others, and what nice things you do to improve everyone’s well-being; everything else is just window dressing. Nice guys finish first because they’ve done the hard work necessary to become so self-aware that they’re genuinely happy with themselves and are able to spread that joy. If you want to find out who really finishes last, look for the miserable person trying to make another million or billion so he can feel safe for another ten minutes.

What will you do to develop self-awareness, be nice, and live a great life?

Cheers,

Guy

Self-Awareness, Congruence, and Happiness - On Developing Self-Awareness and Being Self-Aware

Self-Awareness, Congruence, and Happiness

/ / Self and Self-Awareness, Self-Awareness, Self-Consciousness / , ,

Congruence is a big part of self-awareness and simply means that your thoughts and actions match each other. A lot of people live lives where they think one thing but behave in ways that aren’t consistent with those thoughts. This creates tension and inner conflict.

One of the best ways to achieve congruence is to act in ways that are consistent with what you think. For example: If you say you’re going to do something, do it; if you believe something, make sure your actions match. You’ll feel happier and more balanced once you bring your thoughts and actions together.

So many people live terribly unhappy lives because they pretend to be someone they’re not or believe things that don’t stand up to any kind of reasonable scrutiny. Save yourself a lot of pain and misery by working on healing the hurts from your past and educating yourself so you can live a life of courage and joy.

What will you do to develop self-awareness and congruence so you can be happier?

Cheers,

Guy

What Is Self-Awareness and Are You Self-Aware? - On Developing Self-Awareness and Being Self-Aware

What Is Self-Awareness and Are You Self-Aware?

/ / Self and Self-Awareness, Self-Awareness, Self-Consciousness / , , , ,

Self-awareness is a significant part of personal development and it refers to being aware of how your thoughts and behaviors affect you and others. Many people are aware enough to identify things that need attention in their lives but they forget to take action to make it happen. There’s a big difference between knowing you do something and understanding it well enough to move it in a positive direction. Here are some signs you’re self-aware:

  • You’re able to deal with and direct your emotions, thoughts, and behaviors.
  • You build positive relationships, including the one you have with yourself.
  • You genuinely like yourself and others do as well.
  • You live life based on what you really love doing.
  • You know yourself well.
  • You treat yourself and others with kindness and empathy.
  • You understand how the things you feel, think, and do affect you and others.

Cheers,

Guy

Self-Awareness and Emotional Depth - On Developing Self-Awareness and Being Self-Aware

Self-Awareness and Emotional Depth

/ / Self-Awareness, Self-Consciousness / , , , , , / 2 Comments

When you enjoy a high level of self-awareness you’re also likely in touch with your emotions, which helps you relate well to others and live a happier life. Here are some of the characteristics of emotional depth:

  • You recognize and understand other people’s feelings.
  • You understand how your emotions affect others.
  • You don’t work out your personal hurts on other people.
  • You don’t blindly run over people because you’re trying to ignore or placate some deeper emotional issue inside you.
  • You don’t pretend emotions don’t exist or put down people who are “too emotional.”
  • People like you.
  • You’re successful because you’re a nice person.
  • You live a life of empathy.

Many people think that being emotional is something to be avoided at all costs when it’s really just a natural part of being a human being. It’s how you deal with your emotions that impacts how balanced and at peace you are. What will you do to increase your emotional depth?

Cheers,

Guy

Self-Awareness and Living Consciously - On Developing Self-Awareness and Being Self-Aware

Self-Awareness and Living Consciously

/ / Self-Awareness, Self-Consciousness / , , ,

Most people live unconsciously, without much self-awareness, bouncing around from one event to another and reacting based on whatever they feel at that particular moment. They automatically repeat the patterns and roles they learned in their families or wherever they grew up and never move past them. That’s why you see so many adults who behave like children or are perpetually stuck in high school.

Living consciously is an entirely different approach to life. It means building up you self-awareness by getting to know yourself so well that you can deliberately feel, think, and behave positively. It means that you don’t react to things based on your hurts, you actively choose an affirmative path. You’re able to think not only about yourself, but about others and the greater good. You move past reacting to people and events and become a creator and promoter of beautiful things.

There’s no secret to living consciously, it just takes deliberate effort. Be mindful of the things you do each day and take small actions to move in the direction of your dreams. Heal the hurts from your past and move forward courageously to live the life you really want to. What will you do to develop self-awareness and live consciously?

Cheers,

Guy

Lack of Self-Awareness and Ignoring Facts - On Developing Self-Awareness and Being Self-Aware

Lack of Self-Awareness and Ignoring Facts

/ / Self-Awareness, Self-Consciousness / , , ,

Building your self-awareness leads to living a more cohesive, integrated, happy life. I’ve noticed over the years that some people make life more complicated than it needs to be because they ignore facts. It takes a huge amount of time and energy to pretend that something false is true, and all the while you’re trying to support something inaccurate, you’re wasting your life.

The much easier and more satisfying path in life is to stick to demonstrable facts, which will keep you from bending yourself into a pretzel shape to explain things. A big reason I enjoy providing life guidance for people who value self-awareness is that they tend to be open to all kinds of facts and ideas and are comfortable with exploring new avenues of knowledge and understanding.

Life becomes infinitely more complex when you lack self-awareness and try to pretend that facts don’t matter. If you don’t believe in verifiable data then you have to create a whole alternative reality that requires constant rationalization and explanation. The easier route is to just make sure that your feelings, thoughts, and behaviors align with actual evidence so you can live wide awake.

What will you do to develop self-awareness and base your life on verifiable facts?

Cheers,

Guy

Self-Awareness and Balance - On Developing Self-Awareness and Being Self-Aware

Self-Awareness and Balance

/ / Self-Awareness, Self-Consciousness / , , , , ,

Self-awareness helps you maintain balance between the various parts of your life because you’re able to step back and assess what you’re doing at any given moment. Many people live their entire lives without taking the time to examine their thoughts and actions and the reasons behind them. When you consciously and continuously review what you’re doing, you’re able to deal with a range of issues in your life, especially the difficult ones.

Putting off dealing with unpleasant or scary situations creates a lack of harmony in your life because, if you don’t fix things, they don’t go away. The irony is that, if you decide to resolve the challenges in your life instead of avoiding them or pretending they don’t exist, you give yourself the opportunity to live more meaningfully and happily.

Balance is about understanding that you are made up of different facets and that they all require attention to be healthy and happy. What will you do to invite balance into your life?

Cheers,

Guy

The Self-Awareness Guy