As a passionate advocate of growth, I’m continuously looking for ways
to self-improve. I’ve compiled 42 of my best tips which might be
helpful in your personal growth journey. Some of them are simple steps
which you can engage in immediately. Some are bigger steps which takes
conscious effort to act on. Here they are:
- Read a book every day. Books
are concentrated sources of wisdom. The more books you read, the more
wisdom you expose yourself to. What are some books you can start reading
to enrich yourself? Some books I’ve read and found useful are Think and
Grow Rich, Who Moved My Cheese, 7 Habits, The Science of Getting Rich
and Living the 80/20 Way. I’ve heard positive reviews for The Tipping
Point, Outliers and The Difference Maker, so I’ll be checking them out
soon.
- Learn a new language. Try as much to have an idea of a new language from your original native language.
- Pick up a new hobby.
Beyond just your usual favorite hobbies, is there something new you can
pick up? Any new sport you can learn? Examples are fencing, golf, rock
climbing, football, canoeing, or ice skating. Your new hobby can also be
a recreational hobby. For example, pottery, Italian cooking, dancing,
wine appreciation, web design, etc. Learning something new requires you
to stretch yourself in different aspects, whether physically, mentally
or emotionally.
- Take up a new course.
Is there any new course you can join? Courses are a great way to gain
new knowledge and skills. It doesn’t have to be a long-term course –
seminars or workshops serve their purpose too. I’ve been to a few
workshops and they have helped me gain new insights which I had not
considered before.
- Create an inspirational room.
Your environment sets the mood and tone for you. If you are living in
an inspirational environment, you are going to be inspired every day. In
the past, I didn’t like my room at all because I thought it was messy
and dull. A few years ago, I decided this was the end of it – I started
on a “Mega Room Revamp” project and overhauled my room. The end result? A
room I totally relish being in and inspires me to be at my peak every
day.
- Overcome your fears. All of us have fears.
Fear of uncertainty, fear of public speaking, fear of risk… All our
fears keep us in the same position and prevent us from growing.
Recognize that your fears reflect areas where you can grow. I always
think of fears as the compass for growth. If I have a fear about
something, it represents something I’ve yet to address, and addressing
it helps me to grow.
- Level up your skills. Gaining experience so you can be better and
stronger. As a blogger, I’m constantly leveling up my writing skills. As
a speaker, I’m constantly leveling up my public engagement abilities.
What skills can you level up?
- Wake up early.
Waking up early (say, 5-6am) has been acknowledged by many to improve your
productivity and your quality of life. I feel it’s because when you wake
up early, your mindset is already set to continue the momentum and
proactively live out the day.
- Have a weekly exercise routine.
A better you starts with being in better physical shape. I personally
make it a point to jog at least 3 times a week, at least 30 minutes each
time. You may want to mix it up with jogging, gym lessons and swimming
for variation.
- Start your life handbook. A
life handbook is an idea I started 7 years ago. Basically, it’s a book
which contains the essentials on how you can live your life to the
fullest, such as your purpose, your values and goals. Sort of like your
manual for your life. I started my life handbook since 2009 and it’s
been a crucial enabler in my progress.
- Write a letter to your future self.
What do you see yourself as 5 years from now? Will you be the same?
Different? What kind of person will you be? Write a letter to your
future self – 1 year from now will be a good start – and seal it. Make a
date in your calendar to open it 1 year from now. Then start working to
become the person you want to open that letter.
- Get out of your comfort zone. Real
growth comes with hard work and sweat. Being too comfortable doesn’t
help us grow – it makes us stagnate. What is your comfort zone? Do you
stay in most of the time? Do you keep to your own space when out with
other people? Shake your routine up. Do something different. By exposing
yourself to a new context, you’re literally growing as you learn to act
in new circumstances.
- Put someone up to a challenge.
Competition is one of the best ways to grow. Set a challenge (weight
loss, exercise, financial challenge, etc) and compete with an interested
friend to see who achieves the target first. Through the process, both
of you will gain more than if you were to set off on the target alone.
- Identify your blind spots.
Scientifically, blind spots refer to areas our eyes are not capable of
seeing. In personal development terms, blind spots are things about
ourselves we are unaware of. Discovering our blind spots help us
discover our areas of improvement. One exercise I use to discover my
blind spots is to identify all the things/events/people that trigger me
in a day – trigger meaning making me feel annoyed/weird/affected. These
represent my blind spots. It’s always fun to do the exercise because I
discover new things about myself, even if I may already think I know my
own blind spots (but then they wouldn’t be blind spots would they?).
After that, I work on steps to address them.
- Ask for feedback. As
much as we try to improve, we will always have blind spots. Asking for
feedback gives us an additional perspective. Some people to approach
will be friends, family, colleagues, boss, or even acquaintances, since
they will have no preset bias and can give their feedback objectively.
- Stay focused with to-do lists.
I start my day with a list of tasks I want to complete and this helps
make me stay focused. In comparison, the days when I don’t do this end
up being extremely unproductive. Since my work requires me to use my computer all the time, I use Free Sticky Notes to manage my to-do lists. It’s really simple to use and it’s a freeware, so I recommend you check it out.
- Set Big Hairy Audacious Goals (BHAGs).
I’m a big fan of setting BHAGs. BHAGs stretch you beyond your normal
capacity since they are big and audacious – you wouldn’t think of
attempting them normally. What are BHAGs you can embark on, which you’ll
feel absolutely on top of the world once you complete them? Set them
and start working on them.
- Acknowledge your flaws.
Everyone has flaws. What’s most important is to understand them,
acknowledge them, and address them. What do you think are your flaws?
What are the flaws you can work on now? How do you want to address them?
- Get into action.
The best way to learn and improve is to take action. What is something
you have been meaning to do? How can you take action on it immediately?
Waiting doesn’t get anything done. Taking action gives you immediate
results to learn from.
- Learn from people who inspire you.
Think about people you admire. People who inspire you. These people
reflect certain qualities you want to have for yourself too. What are
the qualities in them you want to have for yourself? How can you acquire
these qualities?
- Quit a bad habit. Are there
any bad habits you can lose? Oversleeping? Not exercising? Being late?
Slouching? Nail biting? Smoking?.
- Cultivate a new habit.
Some good new habits to cultivate include reading books (#1), waking up
early (#8), exercising (#9), reading a new personal development article
a day (#40) and meditating. Is there any other new habit you can
cultivate to improve yourself?
- Avoid negative people.
As Jim Rohn says, “You are the average of the 5 people you spend the
most time with”. Wherever we go, there are bound to be negative people.
Don’t spend too much of your time around them if you feel they drag you
down.
- Learn to deal with difficult people.
There are times when there are difficult people you can’t avoid, such
as at your workplace, or when the person is part of your inner circle of
contacts. Learn how to deal with them. These people management skills
will go a long way in working with people in the future.
- Learn from your friends.
Everyone has amazing qualities in them. It’s up to how we want to tap
into them. With all the friends who surround you, they are going to have
things you can learn from. Try thinking of a good friend right now.
Think about just one quality they have which you want to adopt. How can
you learn from them and adopt this skill for yourself? Speak to them if
you need to – for sure, they will be more than happy to help!
- Start a journal.
Journaling is a great way to gain better self-awareness. It’s a
self-reflection process. As you write, clarify your thought process and
read what you wrote from a third person’s perspective, you gain more
insights about yourself. Your journal can be private or an online blog. I
use my personal development blog as a personal journal too and I’ve
learned a lot about myself through the past year of blogging.
- Start a blog about personal development.
To help others grow, you need to first be walking the talk. There are
expectations of you, both from yourself and from others, which you have
to uphold. I run The Life now blog, where I share my personal
journey and insights on how to live a better life. Readers look toward
my articles to improve themselves, which enforces to me that I need to
keep improving, for myself and for the people I’m reaching out to.
- Get a mentor or coach.
There’s no faster way to improve than to have someone work with you on
your goals. Many of my clients approach me to coach them in their goals
and they achieve significantly more results than if they had worked
alone.
- Reduce the time you spend on chat programs. I
realized having chat programs open at default result in a lot of wasted
time. This time can be much better spent on other activities. The days
when I don’t get on chat, I get a lot more done. I usually disable the
auto start-up option in the chat programs and launch them when I do want
to chat and really have the time for it.
- Learn chess (or any strategy game).
I found chess is a terrific game to learn strategy and hone your
brainpower. Not only do you have fun, you also get to exercise your
analytical skills. You can also learn strategy from other board games or
computer games, such as Othello, Chinese Chess, WarCraft, and so on.
- Stop watching TV. I’ve
not been watching TV for pretty much 4 years and it’s been a very
liberating experience. I realized most of the programs and
advertisements on mainstream TV are usually of a lower consciousness and
not very empowering. In return, the time I’ve freed up from not
watching TV is now constructively used for other purposes, such as
connecting with close friends, doing work I enjoy, exercising, etc.
- Start a 30-day challenge.
Set a goal and give yourself 30 days to achieve this. Your goal can be
to stick with a new habit or something you’ve always wanted to do but
have not. 30 days is just enough time to strategize, plan, get into
action, review and nail the goal.
- Meditate.
Meditation helps to calm you and be more conscious. I also realized
that during the nights when I meditate (before I sleep), I need lesser
sleep. The clutter clearing process is very liberating.
- Join Toastmasters (Learn public speaking). Interestingly, public speaking
is the #1 fear in the world, with #2 being death. After I started
public speaking as a personal development speaker/trainer, I’ve learned a
lot about how to communicate better, present myself and engage people.
Toastmasters is an international organization that trains people in
public speaking. Check out the Toastmaster clubs nearest to you here.
- Befriend top people in their fields.
These people have achieved their results because they have the right
attitudes, skill sets and know-how. How better to learn than from the
people who have been there and done that? Gain new insights from them on
how you can improve and achieve the same results for yourself.
- Let go of the past.
Is there any grievance or unhappiness from the past which you have been
holding on? If so, it’s time to let it go. Holding on to them prevents
you from moving on and becoming a better person. Break away from the
past, forgive yourself, and move on. Just recently, I finally moved on
from a past heartbreak of 5 years ago. The effect was liberating and
very empowering, and I have never been happier.
- Start a business venture. Is
there anything you have an interest in? Why not turn it into a venture
and make money while learning at the same time? Starting a new venture
requires you to be learn business management skills, develop business
acumen and have a competitive edge. The process of starting and
developing my personal development business has equipped me with many
skills, such as self-discipline, leadership, organization and
management.
- Show kindness to people around you.
You can never be too kind to someone. In fact, most of us don’t show
enough kindness to people around us. Being kind helps us to cultivate
other qualities such as compassion, patience, and love. As you get back
to your day after reading this article later on, start exuding more
kindness to the people around you, and see how they react. Not only
that, notice how you feel as you behave kindly to others. Chances are,
you will feel even better than yourself.
- Reach out to the people who hate you.
If you ever stand for something, you are going to get haters. It’s easy
to hate the people who hate us. It’s much more challenging to love them
back. Being able to forgive, let go and show love to these people
requires magnanimity and an open heart. Is there anyone who dislikes or
hates you in your life? If so, reach out to them. Show them love. Seek a
resolution and get closure on past grievances. Even if they refuses to
reciprocate, love them all the same. It’s much more liberating than to
hate them back.
- Take a break. Have you been
working too hard? Self-improvement is also about recognizing our need to
take a break to walk the longer mile ahead. You can’t be driving a car
if it has no petrol. Take some time off for yourself every week. Relax,
rejuvenate and charge yourself up for what’s up ahead.
- Read at least 1 personal development article a day.
Some of my readers make it a point to read at least one personal
development article every day, which I think is a great habit. There are
many terrific personal development blogs out there, some of which you can check here.
- Commit to your personal growth.
I can be writing list articles with 10 ways, 25 ways, 42 ways or even
1,000 ways to improve yourself, but if you’ve no intention to commit to
your personal growth, it doesn’t matter what I write. Nothing is going
to get through. We are responsible for our personal growth – not anyone
else. Not your mom, your dad, your friend, or me. Make the
decision to commit to your personal growth and embrace yourself to a
life-long journey of growth and change. Kick off your growth by picking a
few of the steps above and working on them. The results may not be
immediate, but I promise you that as long as you keep to it, you’ll
start seeing positive changes in yourself and your life.
I’d
love to hear your thoughts on this article or anything about personal
growth. Feel free to share your thoughts in a comment below and I’ll get
back to you! If you have any other suggestions to add to the list,
please share with us too!
