We know from psychology that the first years of a person's life are the most formative. Parents and confidants teach children skills that are essential for later adult life. This includes many social skills that have a much more significant impact on the career than is sometimes assumed. We do not always have the skills relevant for professional life or a particular position—the good thing: you never stop learning. You can actively approach your self-development and promote yourself. You can find out what options you have here.
Self-development definition: 4 areas of change
Self-development can mean many things, depending on what your focus is. It can be roughly divided into four areas:
Self-development as personality development
This should rather be understood as social skills that are related to one's personality. This partially quite abstract area has already been mentioned above. Personality development plays an essential role in contact with other people and contributes to success or failure. It is impossible to say precisely which property is more important or that it must only be specific properties.
Experience has shown, for example, that assertiveness is a quality that is important for professional success. If you want to advance in the company, you might want to work on it. On the other hand, soft skills such as the ability to work in a team are worth improving. So it is not an either-or, but rather an "also."
Self-development as self-coaching
This form of self-development is much more tangible. This refers to the methods of self-coaching. Here, self-development can be understood as synonymous with self-management, self-coaching, and time management.
Depending on which area you want to change, change your routines and lifestyle. You want to do something for your health, so incorporate more exercise into your schedule. You want to lose weight, so incorporate healthier foods into your diet. You never get by with your time and are constantly chasing deadlines, so get on with the uncomfortable tasks first and then move on to the pleasant ones. Then turn off the time wasters and eliminate them.
Self-development as further training
Self-development can also mean lifelong learning. You have noticed that the activities in your old job no longer satisfy you. There are many opportunities for change here. For example, a further training course is conceivable. You can build on existing knowledge in your profession and gain additional qualifications, for example, to be able to occupy a management position later.
You can also do further training in a completely different area because you are planning a job change.
Self-development as a search for meaning
This form of self-development is similar to personality development. Still, the difference here is in intention. Some associate the acquisition of social skills with specific professional desires or personal success.
Others, on the other hand, are more spiritually searching for meaning. Quite a few people now combine work, private life, and spirituality. Zen Buddhism is one of the spiritual currents that is enjoying increasing popularity, especially among executives. It is practiced in the West as a possibility for meditation and enlightenment and is supposed to protect against burnout, among other things.
Self-Development: Recognizing the Need
When the facility and its surroundings shape a person, it is also clear that not all people are endowed with the same skills. For example, those who grew up in an emotionally cold home and received little recognition and attention will not infrequently have a low level of self-esteem. What "only" causes difficulties in social contact during school hours can have lasting effects in later professional life. How should someone who is technically absolutely qualified, but on the other hand nothing trusts, executives are?
The starting conditions are not always ideal. Parents who are not familiar with the education system and the local opportunities will be sent to secondary school. However, their intellectual abilities would have made it possible for them to graduate from high school. Feelings of inferiority and secondary school qualifications impact career choice: Supposedly demanding jobs are not even considered. People remain below their possibilities.
As long as no one is bothered, including yourself, there is no need to change anything. However, if you want more out of life, you need to be active in your self-development. Whining can give you short-term relief. But in the long run, it won't help you and only annoys others.
Consolidation of character and satisfaction
Due to the demands of a more complex working life, some may feel the desire to make some changes in their life with self-development. That is entirely legitimate and future-oriented because, in fact, new technical inventions always pose new challenges for us. And it is well known that flexibility decreases with increasing age. The personality is considered to be established from around 30, but personality traits such as openness also reduce in old age. Until then, you can still change something about yourself to a certain extent.
The focus here should not be on compulsive self-optimization. Instead, self-development opens up the possibility of consolidating your character and becoming more satisfied, for example, by examining your goals, hopes, and desires and thinking about what to do. This includes that identify and activate your resources. Where do you draw strength from? Who is supporting you? What is preventing you from progressing? Such questions are a start.
Self-development as a maturation process
Self-development is a maturation process that takes place on the "path to the true self." Imagine that figuratively as a gift that is not wrapped but unwrapped, in the truest sense of the word un-wrapped is. You develop your potential and what has always been in you comes to light, but which has remained hidden from the eye. With a planned self-development, you will become what you want to be. That presupposes self-reflection and self-knowledge. This includes questions like:
- Who am I?
- What makes me
- What are my strengths and weaknesses?
- How do I want to be
- What did I achieve?
- What do I want to change?
- What am I ready to do for it?
- What is important to me
- What is easy for me, what is difficult?
- How can I go about something?
Self-development is a decision.
Honestly applied, such a cash drop in life is not always pleasant. Sometimes uncomfortable truths come to light, and personal deficits are revealed. But from any point, it is time for self-responsibility to take over. You cannot always blame circumstances or others for your problems. It is up to you to deal with, for example, professional difficulties, non-functioning partnerships, or weaknesses in character. This includes making decisions and making them consciously.
Self-development: do you have the courage to change?
Quite a few people shy away from it - often out of fear of doing something wrong. The disadvantage: In that case, someone else decides for you, and you make yourself dependent on the circumstances. Self-development, therefore, requires the courage to change. You have to leave the comfort zone that gave you security until now.
Example: You urgently need a vehicle. You are interested in two used vehicles but are hesitating to decide because you are not sure. They both look equally good, but you can only buy one car. You wait until someone else buys one of the two cars, and you no longer have a choice. You have to take what's left. This example seems succinct. But what if you find out in retrospect that the leftover used car was the worse choice after all? And whoever finds it challenging to make decisions as a whole will also have problems with significantly more critical questions in life. It is by no means the case that all decisions that are not made or made incorrectly have irreversible consequences.