How to Develop Self-Awareness

Self-awareness helps us create and manage change and helps us face our fears. Self-awareness is essential to growth. But how do you develop self-awareness?

To develop self-awareness, start with observing, noticing and listening.

Self-awareness describes your ability to:

Observe yourself: what actions do you take, or don’t take? How do you spend your time and energy?

Notice your behaviour and thinking patterns: how do you react and respond to events in your life?

Listen to the words that you think and say: what impact do they have on you? What world view do they create for you? How do your words shape your beliefs about yourself?

To develop self-awareness, think about how you think.

Pause to consider your observations about yourself. Think about your thinking. Question what you’ve observed about yourself:

Do your actions empower you or limit you?

Do you want to continue living the same patterns of how you react, respond and act, or would you like to interrupt the pattern and try something different?

What adjustments could you make in your thinking and behaviour to positively affect your mood?

How you respond to questioning yourself will be greatly influenced by the degree to which you have these traits:

humility to admit that you there’s room for improvement,

curiosity to explore other ways of being, thinking and doing,

courage to make a change even if it feels uncomfortable and

patience and self-compassion to help with knowing that change is never easy and that new ways of being take time to become habits.

Building your self-awareness helps you get to know yourself. – Lisa Jeffs

Pausing, noticing and observing are the first steps to developing self-awareness. But how do you remember to pause, notice and observe? Thankfully, there are ways to train our brains to build this skill. That’s what I’ll talk about in my next post.

What awareness did reading this post bring up for you?

Image by Deagreez (iStock)