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Trust Yourself More To Promote Self-Growth

With personal development, just like with any other kind of learning process, it’s always easier to follow an example set by someone else. But while it’s definitely easier to read books and attend classes, it doesn’t mean you can’t achieve the same result learning everything yourself.

Personal development is personal

Personal development is no different from any other science in this regard, but you have a really good advantage – personal development is very personal in its nature, and this means you have a much better chance of succeeding simply by concentrating more on your own thoughts and feelings, instead of reading books and constantly seeking guidance from someone else.

I’ve recently started a 10-week course of intermediate swimming lessons, as I felt it was time to improve my technique and the opportunity came up. Yesterday, while enjoying my class, I suddently noticed that our personal development is in many ways similar to swimming lessons.

Learning the basics of self-growth

When you’re only learning to swim, you should, ideally, have an instructror spend a good few hours with you explaining the basics and making sure the water is not deep enough for you or that you at least can stay afloat, no matter how bad your moves are. Your instructor will make sure you’re put in an adequate swimming pool, and will closely watch your first few minutes in the water to both accomodate you and make sure you don’t drown before you get the idea.

You’re taught what to expect from a water and how to rely on your own body’s strength, then you’re explained what to do if you feel like you’re drowning – or what not to do in such a case. You’re shown how to properly breathe, and you’re guarded while you make your very first strokes in an attempt to cover the minimal distance. You’re greatly supported and encouraged afterwards and they say it’s only a matter of practice from that first moment on till you get really good at swimming.

Come think of it, the very same thing should ideally happen with our personal development. Wouldn’t it be great to have someone explain to you the basics and show the right way of implementing self-improvement techniques? It would also be of huge importance to have somebody support us in our first steps, guide us through conversations, explain what we should and shouldn’t say in particular situations, and give us a demonstration of how all them little pieces of our self-growth mosaic are wonderfully working together when combined correctly. And yes, we do want some encouragement and approval of our first steps! We want somebody else to step in and say: you’re doing allright, just keep it this way and you’ll grow real quick in no time.

But do we have it happening to us? Not usually, no.

Sometimes you just have to do it yourself

Unfortunately, not everything is ideal in this world. So it really is up to us to find a reliable and suitable source of information, to interact with our friends and colleagues, and see if their expectations and knowledge fit into our idea of our self-growth.

Again, it’s very similar to swimming lessons. It’s great when you are trained professionally from your very first swim, but at the same time it’s quite possible to grow into a major swimming success by simply talking to your best friends and having them teach you.

After all, that’s how we gain lots of useful knowledge in this life: by interaction. And usually this interaction happens in an absolutely natural way.

For many of us, it’s also much easier to talk to a friend and not to a specialist, simply because such talking fits in perfectly in a casual kind of interaction, so that it doesn’t look like a weakness or a problem to neither side.

In contrast to this, when you seek professional help, quite often this requires you to get accustomed to the idea that you must be so bad or so lost in your problem that a professional advice really is the only way out. And as rare case as this may be, people do automatically find something negative in taking professional help on quite a number of topics. Personally, I think if there is any negative thinking at all, it’s just a different angle at which you look at the problem. And believe me, it is fairly easy to change this angle.

Learn to find the right way of approaching problems

Here’s an example how you can change the way you think of a particular problem you might have.

First of all, do the quick classification. Does this problem belong to your strong areas or is it one of your weaknesses? If it’s strong, it shouldn’t be so hard for you to come to a moment when you decide to seek help from somebody else.

For instance, if I know I’m good at some subject, yet I have this problem I’ve been trying to solve for some time and I still can’t, it is only a natural thing for me to go and ask someone else who’s supposedly good at this subject. It would be a casual talk, and we’d be talking like professionals – I will have some ideas I’ll share, and the person I’ll be talking to will probably give me some reasonable argumentation or just a hint of what I might be doing wrong to solve my problem.

With your weaknesses it’s even easier – if you know you’re bad at this subject, why struggle? Go on and search the web, or spend a few minutes at your local library, and if you still can’t figure the problem out, go and ask. Don’t torture yourself about it, ask maybe for a hint and try to solve the rest of the problem again. If you still can’t, go and ask for more. It’s that simple.

Don’t be afraid to learn things on your own

Back to coaching, it is important that you have someone to share the knowledge and guide you as you learn. But what’s wrong is to think that being coached is the only way of growing better. This narrow-minded approach is a quite common thing. We’re constantly being told how limited we are on our own. How, without proper books, it’s impossible to get an appropriate level of knowldge, and how without attending a school and a university it is impossible to get skilled enough to have a successfull career.

While mostly it’s true, you shouldn’t forget that these are only the minimal and the easiest ways to gain knowledge. And while it’s advised for you to attent an educational institution for your professional development, nothing stops you from gaining the same knowledge and even more from other sources!

You can always learn things on your own

Trust yourself, and try applying the common sense. Yes, it will probably take you longer to learn something yourself – like swimming for instance, but it’s quite achievable, and many people do it. Just make sure you try it when it’s safe – don’t rush yourself into deep waters hoping to learn to swim the extra quick way – for some of us this comes naturally, and for others it never does.

What I’m trying to say is that it’s never too late for you to try and learn something completely on your own. This holds true for anything: personal development, self-growth, goal setting – you name it. You may read lots of books and blogs, you may watch hundreds of video-courses and listen to motivational and self-growth audiotapes, but some things you will only learn after doing them yourself and learning by trial and error.

Overcome your fear by taking action

Not all the situations are predictable. You can’t plan everything, and sometimes you have to face a situation you really didn’t want to get into. And as scary and uncomfortable as it may be, you have to go through it.

Having no other choice, you will do some steps and you will learn some useful things as you go. Don’t be afraid and don’t feel doomed at any stage – always remember the following: the more uncomfortable some situation is for you, the more likely it is to teach you a very important lesson.

After all, all the awkwardness and unease, all the fear comes from our lack of awareness of the situation. So every time you feel unease about speaking to somebody about a particular thing, this probably means you have some homework to be done first. Once you read more on the subject, you will feel more confident and motivated to try and have the same talk again.

Practice makes perfect

And as you read books, talk to people and learn things, you’ll find it easier and easier to come back and relieve the same situations which at some point in your life seemed absolutely impossible for you to be in.

Don’t get me wrong – not everything has to be learned this hard way. I’ll tell you more: not every uneasy situation is going to be particularly informational and helpful.

But as far as your sefl-growth goes, this fact holds true. If you’re trying to obtain a new skill and you find it uneasy at first – you must be on the right track! Overcome the initial awkwardness, apply yourself harder and work through the number of similar situations – and soon you will realise you’re improving and growing.

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