Self-Awareness Meaning

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

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

25 Characteristics of a Self-Aware Person - On Developing Self-Awareness and Being Self-Aware

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

Self-Awareness and Treating People with Kindness - On Developing Self-Awareness and Being Self-Aware

Self-Awareness and Treating People with Kindness

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Self-awareness leads to treating people with kindness because, when you understand your and others’ emotions, thoughts, and behaviors, you’re able to be more empathic and caring and act in ways that make everyone feel great.

As you work on your self-awareness you’ll be faced with choices on how to behave toward other people. Always remember that the way you treat others is a reflection on how you feel about yourself. Take conscious action to treat people with kindness and you’ll create positive momentum in your own life.

Being kind doesn’t only help other people, it makes you feel great because you spread good vibes in the universe. Each time you think, say, or do something good, you create positive ripples that have a way of making the world a better place.

What will you do to develop self-awareness and treat people with kindness?

Cheers,

Guy

Self-Aware Leaders Don't Discipline Employees - On Developing Self-Awareness and Being Self-Aware

Self-Aware Leaders Don’t Discipline Employees

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Self-aware leaders don’t discipline employees because they understand that being punitive is a poor approach to elicit better performance from people. So why do so many leaders and organizations insist on disciplining everyone? Because they lack self-awareness and the knowledge to do something differently.

See if you recognize this pattern: An employee does something against the rules and sets in motion a complex series of consequences which may include a verbal warning, counseling, reprimanding, written warning, heartfelt lecture and so on up to termination or taking away their TV privileges.

While I understand that workplaces need a standardized, consistent way of dealing with behaviors that break the rules, I’ve found it helpful to encourage an alternate approach that treats employees like thinking, capable people instead of children. Here are 5 ideas to help you deal with negative employee behaviors before you even think about going to the HR manual:

1.  Ask the employee what happened and then listen without interrupting.

2.  Ask the employee to tell you what they did that worked well toward fixing the situation and listen to them. Then ask them what didn’t work as well and listen.

3.  Ask the employee to come up with three recommendations of what they would do to remedy the situation.

4.  Ask the employee to take action on the most important recommendation and give you a time limit by when they will do it. When they report back ask them what three other things they recommend doing and have them follow-through on the top one of that set of ideas and report back.

5.  Praise the employee for the corrections he or she has made.

The trap leaders who lack self-awareness fall into when disciplining employees is that they think they have to correct behaviors through external consequences or punishment rather than helping them learn positive behaviors. This overlooks the concept that employees are able to think for themselves and correct their own behavior.

When I talk with leaders about this approach I invariably get the question, “Well, what if the employee has no clue what to do?” My answer is, you won’t find out until you give them an opportunity to do it. Leaders are so used to running to the rule book that they forget that there are many other ways of resolving all kinds of workplace challenges. The key to this approach is practicing it until people get really good at it. This leads to employees who are able to think critically and problem-solve their own situations.

What will you do to develop self-awareness, stop disciplining employees, and start involving them in improving their own behaviors?

Cheers,

Guy

Self-Awareness and Welcoming Change - On Developing Self-Awareness and Being Self-Aware

Self-Awareness and Welcoming Change

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When you have a high level of self-awareness, you welcome change more easily because you know yourself well and you’re able to find peace and balance no matter what happens in life. A lot of people feel out of control and live reactively because they don’t have a reliable inner compass that keeps them calm and stable. While they may project confidence on the outside, inside it’s a different story. Here are some ways to welcome change instead of running screaming from it:

  • Realize change is always happening.
  • Realize change will continue to happen.
  • Realize you can handle change.
  • Realize that change often opens up new doors of opportunity.
  • Realize that there are things about you that can benefit from change.
  • Realize that you can become stronger by changing.
  • Realize that change can heal you.
  • Realize that change can make your life more enjoyable and fulfilling.

The key to welcoming change is to do something positive with it instead of running around wishing things were different or agonizing about what you can’t control. What will you do to welcome change?

Cheers,

Guy

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

Self-Awareness and Balance

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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

Self-Awareness and Finding Meaning in Your Life - On Developing Self-Awareness and Being Self-Aware

Self-Awareness and Finding Meaning in Your Life

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Many people who lack self-awareness never find meaning in their lives, even when they actively search for it. If you’re on a quest to find meaning in your life here are some ideas to help you find your own answers:

  • Find meaning in yourself, that’s where it lives.
  • Get to know yourself first.
  • Don’t look on the outside for meaning, it’s inside you.
  • Meaning is the same as fulfillment and fulfillment is doing the things that resonate inside you.
  • You’ll find more meaning if you’re willing to look deep inside yourself and deal head-on with the hurts you carry.
  • Don’t let other people tell you what’s meaningful, you decide.
  • Spend conscious and deliberate time doing things that speak to the deeper part of you. In other words, do the things you love each day.
  • Listen to your heart. It will tell you if you are moving toward a meaningful work life or not.
  • Meaning seldom comes from money or power.

Think about these ideas the next time you are searching for ways to live meaningfully. You’ll find that you already have many of the answers inside you if you’re willing to listen. What will you do to develop self-awareness and find meaning in your life?

Cheers,

Guy

The Self-Awareness Guy