Self-reflection. This probably isn’t a foreign concept to you. After all, you only need to scroll social media for a few minutes before you’ll find some post about understanding yourself more deeply.
It’s been a trendy topic since the Ancient Greeks coined the famous phrase, “Know thyself.”
To put it plainly, self-reflection is simply the process of getting to know yourself as an individual. It’s about understanding how you are uniquely hardwired and how your traits, temperament, strengths, weakness, and personality impact your life as a whole.
So…WHY is everyone preaching on the importance of self-reflection? I’d like to point out a few key reasons!
Taking time to get to know yourself can:
Help you understand and utilize your strengths.
We all have strengths. Some strengths are an intrinsic part of who we are. In essence, we are born with them. Others have been learned and refined over time.
All strengths, whether natural ability or learned skill, can be honed and strengthened when given careful attention.
Part of truly understanding yourself is being able to identify what you are GOOD AT. Knowing your strengths will enable you to put those valuable skills to use in a way that is most beneficial for you and others. In other words, this self-knowledge will make you a more productive and effective person in all aspects of your life.
Help you identify and manage your weaknesses.
FACT: Nobody excels at everything. (Don’t worry…no one expects you to.)
Just as we all have unique strengths, we also each have weaknesses that need to be accounted for. Being aware of your weaknesses isn’t about feeling bad about yourself or hyper-focusing on your flaws, but merely this awareness will help you to identify the areas in your life where you may need a little help.
In some cases, the solution is to actively try to strengthen an area of weakness. For example, if time management is one of your struggles, you may implement habits such as setting activity timers or adding “buffer time” into your schedule to make up for this deficit.
In other cases, the best thing to do is simply to acknowledge that a particular task just isn’t your strength and to delegate to someone else. (This is exactly why I brought a content writer onto my team.)
Help you understand what motivates you.
Ah, motivation…an integral puzzle piece when it comes to productivity and achievement.
We are all motivated by different things. For some, the best motivation comes in the form of relationships. These individuals would scale a mountain for a kind word of affirmation or a nod of approval.
For others, motivation may come in the form of intrigue or excitement. New challenges or problems to solve can create an adrenaline rush that propels you forward.
Whatever it is, it’s important to know and understand YOUR primary motivators. With this knowledge, you will be more able to design situations that motivate you and foster productivity rather than waiting for random sparks of motivation to occur on their own.
Help you understand your struggles.
Each person struggles with different things and different situations. The more deeply you know yourself, the better you’ll be able to process and understand why certain situations are challenging for you to handle.
This self-knowledge is important. Understanding your struggles will help you anticipate future situations that may be challenging and identify tools and strategies to help you when dealing with difficulties.
There’s no other way to slice it…taking the time for self-reflection is such an important and necessary practice. The better you understand yourself, the more equipped you’ll be to make choices that bring out the best in you. Even if you’ve done this work before, I recommend reexamining your reflection from time to time.
Why?
We are constantly growing, changing, and evolving. New experiences and new seasons of life provide the opportunity for a deeper understanding of ourselves.
If self-reflection is new to you OR you haven’t taken the time to really get to know yourself in a while, let this be the month you start!
Over the course of the next few weeks, I’ll be introducing a few of my favorite tools for facilitating deeper self-awareness.
Have you taken the time to do some self-reflection in the past?
Please reply and tell us about YOUR favorite self-discovery tool?
Article was contributed by: Maria Lees, Team Writer with Sarah Boxx
