Here’s a Quick Way to Jump Start Self-Improvement
If we want to be successful in life, we have to work on self-improvement, even if it isn’t easy. If we don’t, we risk settling for a far less life than what is possible for us and never reaching our full potential and best version of ourselves.
There are so many ways to work on and create the best version of ourselves through habits, actions, and mindsets. How we grow as individuals is ultimately up to us, and how we handle the circumstances around us. But we do have control of what we feed ourselves with and put into ourselves.
If you are struggling with your self-improvement, you don’t have to go take a $5,000 weekend course to jump start your self-improvement. Start with these 3 steps and see where your journey takes you.
**Read. This one is the most obvious one and most talked about way to start a path to self-improvement — however, it’s essential. There is a reason that people who are super successful are often times readers. It’s ok if you don’t like to read. You don’t have to read 50 books a year or visit the self-help section of the bookstore every month to still benefit from this timeless habit. But reading even a few pages a day or a few impactful books a year could be game changers in our lives.
Just the act of reading will cultivate a growth mindset within yourself. If you want to succeed and you want to improve, you must have a growth mindset. Reading almost forces you to learn something new. Even if it’s not something from the text you are reading, there will be thoughts and ideas that are spurred on by the words you read.
By reading books that help us grow and improve, we are wiring our brain in a positive way. What are you missing in life? What’s your weakness? Need more internal grit? Drive? A better attitude towards others? There is a book for it — whatever the need — and you can find it and read it.
Whatever the struggle in our life or challenge you are facing, someone, somewhere, faced that challenge before and most likely wrote about it. Why would we not take advantage of that?
On top of both of those reasons, books teach us how others have succeeded, faced challenges, cultivated winning attitudes, built businesses, and survived unbeatable odds in the face of adversity. From these lessons we can not only find inspiration and knowledge, but we can also find perspective.
Reading is something that we can all find a way to do. Don’t like reading? Get an audiobook or listen to a meaningful podcast, but find a way to put something positive into your mind.
**Exercise. When we think of exercising we think of sweating, being out of breath, and pain. Typically, after a long day at work, this feels like the very last thing you want to do with your time. However, as Benjamin Franklin said, “That which hurts, also instructs”.
While exercising may be painful and take your breath away in a not so pleasant way, there are so many benefits from it, that it’s truly hard to ignore. Many of the most successful entrepreneurs in the world start their day or end their day with a workout. From running, lifting weights, playing tennis, and yoga — there are so many who use this time to get away from it all.
But you don’t have to have some world class workout or beat yourself up in the gym to receive the benefits of this. A simple walk or some light stretching is better than nothing. Walking has been a way for people to find clarity for thousands of years. The greatest leaders and philosophers of the ancient world believed in walks. Many of the most famous writers in history walked when they were stuck.
So, why can’t we take a walk? Or, go for a run or hit the gym? Yes, taking care of your body should be a priority in our path to self-improvement. But allowing our mind to be worked out is so valuable as well.
This isn’t about being able to look like the model on the magazine cover. It’s about creating a place that you can build a stronger and healthier mind and body. Which you can’t do on the couch eating potato chips, while watching the latest headlines of what went wrong in the world today.
Choose wisely. We could all use a little more strength in our mind, body, and soul.
**Journal. The act of getting out a pen and paper everyday seems so simple. And yet, how many people take the time to do this? Who doesn’t have 5 minutes a day, even less, to write down how they feel, what’s bothering them, what they’re excited about, and what they feel they could do better tomorrow.
Instead, we just carry these emotions around with us like baggage. Taking it from one conversation to another, never stopping to let it go and put aside. This creates so much unneeded baggage within us. Over time — especially when something is bothering us — we lose focus and clarity because we’ve allowed this “thing” to walk around with us, rattling around in our head. We don’t have to live this way and it won’t help you on your road to jump starting your self-improvement.
Get it out. Find clarity within. Remove the clutter that’s in your head. Address the things that are bothering you and then, move on.
Paper has patience that we can’t find with individuals. There is no judgement within those pages. The pages are where we go to find clarity, work through problems — on paper — that need worked on, and ask good questions about our lives.
Where am I struggling? Could I have handled that better? Where can I get better?
It’s through this practice and these pages that we will begin to better understand what really matters, how we can work towards it, and how we can avoid allowing our emotions to dictate our responses. This helps us become so much more grounded and focused on our journey of growth.
So what are you waiting for? These 3 things are so simple, yet so effective. Whether you have an hour a day to focus on these or four hours a day, it doesn’t matter. Even a little bit of each can help you make great strides in your self improvement and help you find more clarity and focus, which all of us could use more of in this busy world that we now live in.
All three of these actions create time for us to step away from the phone calls, emails, text messages, and social media. It pulls us away from the alerts and the up to the minute news that has become so routine in our lives. We need to step away from it, even for a few minutes, and find space between us and all that noise.
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