How to be Self Aware
What is Self Awareness?
For many of us it’s having a clear idea of who we are as a human, what we are about, what are beliefs are, what motivates us and what are strengths and weaknesses are. It also allows us to understand other humans how they interact with us and how we act or react around them.
How to become Self Aware
First, you must believe in yourself! Self belief provides us with confidence and a sense of self which is what we then portray to the world around us. Trust in yourself and your actions, regardless of outside noise. Support all of your choices and decisions, you are your own best advocate.
YOU and only YOU knows what is best for YOU.
How to Increase Self Awareness
Stay firm in your self belief, by keeping connected to what you believe, what your values and morals are, how you feel and act/react around people and how much integrity you want to live your life. Do not dilute your self awareness by listening to others and their ideas of who they think you are.
By strengthening your self-belief your voice will become more powerful than others who try to disparage you. You will imitate the outer person with the inner person leaving no room for differences or confusion.
Positive Self Awareness
In order to gain positive self awareness you must always speak positively to YOURSELF about YOURSELF
Negative self thoughts or feelings are not true and do not benefit you. You need to shift any self negativity into a positive, and this requires practice and self discipline. This takes work but the results are life changing and beneficial for life.
Every day ensure that you compliment yourself or give credit to yourself for something that you did that day, no matter how small or insignificant, heck sometimes it can be just getting out of bed on a Monday morning to go to work!
How to Strengthen your Self Awareness
Obviously maintaining all the above is a given but if you don’t already practice it you can also meditate, 5/10/15 mins whenever or however you feel comfortable. Become mindful of your surroundings and live in the moment.
Writing down some goals, key plans or priorities that you aim to complete and then track your progress over the allotted time. Once you have written down something it’s easier to focus the mind and you inwardly become responsible for completing the task.
Journaling is also a good way to strengthen your self-awareness and allows you to look back objectively at your thoughts and feelings that you have penned.
Being self-aware and understanding how you are perceived by others is also important. How often do you deliberately seek out feedback about yourself from your nearest and dearest? I’m guessing like most of us, probably not that often, yet good feedback is one of the quickest and most effective ways to grow and improve yourself.
Summary
Self Awareness is simply the capacity to observe ourselves and our habits, to take notice of and pay attention to patterns within our thoughts, feelings, and behaviours and sometimes to adjust or eliminate them.
Self Awareness is a skill that we all have and something we should utilise fully.
14 Comments
Claudia H. Blanton · September 23, 2019 at 8:37 pm
I like that you mentioned positive self-awareness and mindfulness. First of all – self-awareness, I think can surely become self-defeating, if it is not approached lovingly. While knowing one’s own faults and limitations is a good thing, over-emphasizing on them can limit progress, especially if someone already tends to be depressed, as you mentioned.
I recently started a more thorough mindfulness practice, and it has made me a lot more aware of situations when I begin to think negatively, almost automatically. It has helped me to stop that especially while doing mundane tasks, that do not require much thinking.
One of my favorite books on the subject is called Peace Is Every Step by Thich Nhat Hanh – if you have not read it, you should check it out.
Love your website!
Blessings!
Julie Anne Byrne · September 24, 2019 at 12:17 pm
Hi Claudia, thanks for stopping by and your comments, delighted you love my website 😉
Positive Mindfulness is a great tool to have as we negotiate our way through this journey, realising that the voice inside our heads is just that a voice, and it does not always speak our truth, this is an awareness that I wish everyone was attuned to.
Thanks for the book recommendation, not one I had read before but I shall look it up!
Wishing you the very best, Julie Anne
Tom · September 23, 2019 at 8:40 pm
Hi Julie,
Thanks for this post, it came at the right time. I am in the process of sorting out my head and becoming more self aware and being honest with myself.
This is down to my productivity with my business, I need to do more. However, I have realised this and started writing down goals and being more organised.
How do you recommend keeping up this mindset, because I find that I start well doing this, but struggle to keep it up?
Julie Anne Byrne · September 24, 2019 at 12:11 pm
Hi Tom, it’s never to late to put these practices in place, writing down your goals makes you own them and I think we all like ticking things off a list however small, provides for a great sense of achievement!
One way to maintain this mindset would be to schedule a set time at the beginning of each month to write your goals for that month and as an incentive write at the end of your list a reward that you will receive from yourself when you accomplish the goals within that month, I would think this could work for both business and personal goals.
Let me know how you get on and remember if that doesn’t work, draw a line under it and move on to something else that might work. Don’t give up!
All the best, Julie Anne 🙂
Russ Green · September 23, 2019 at 8:42 pm
Wow, what a very interesting post, I think many of us never stop and think about being self aware and reading your post here really does give food for thought.
The closest I have come to this kind self awareness was quite a while ago when I was reading up on Buddhism, there was some similarities, however, this is a very educational and informative post, I will be practicing these techniques and I will also share this with some friends of mine who I know are interested in this subject, thank you for sharing this post.
Julie Anne Byrne · September 24, 2019 at 3:04 pm
Thanks Russ, glad you found my post informative. I agree with you on the similarities of Buddhims, I also enjoy the practices of Buddhism and each and every time I become more enlightened.
Let me know how you get on practicing these techniques and what ones work for you.
All the best to you, Julie Anne
MariaSHC · September 23, 2019 at 8:42 pm
I find self awareness has a direct influence on achieving my goals. As the article points out, negative thoughts have zero benefits.
Setting goals is one thing. Actually fulfilling those goals takes absolute self-belief. It is this belief and awareness that will help you find ways around obstacles and problems you may encounter.
You have to counter that little voice saying “No, you can’t do this” with “Try again. You have the skills. Use them and do it.”
Julie Anne Byrne · September 24, 2019 at 3:07 pm
I agree Maria self belief is the foundation that we can build our self awareness on. Learning to counteract the negative thoughts takes practice but overtime it becomes like all habits easy to do.
We all have the skills we just need to tap into them and put them into practice in order to reap the benefits.
Thanks for your comment and wishing you the very best of luck, Julie Anne
Pentrental · September 23, 2019 at 8:42 pm
Self awareness is really important and I appreciate you putting it into perspective here.
Sometimes it can be difficult to step outside the box, and it can be even more difficult to step out and look inward at the self. I agree that it starts with believing in one’s self.
After all, who else is going to truly believe? Especially when you’re starting out as an entrepreneur it can be challenging, and we must really dig deep at times.
I think that writing in a journal can be a great way to channel emotions and insights. This is a really great post with a positive, message. Keep up the good work and I’m looking forward to reading more!
Julie Anne Byrne · September 24, 2019 at 3:33 pm
Thanks for your comments, I’m glad you liked my post! It’s very important that our inner self is the same as the outer self as this makes us more authentic and trustworthy.
You are right keeping a journal of your thoughts and emotions is a very worthwhile exercise, even if it is not something you think you can sustain doing it for a short period of time will allow you to review who you are and how you react to situations as they arise.
I look forward to providing you with future positive posts.
All the best, Julie Anne
Henry · September 23, 2019 at 8:56 pm
Hi! This is a very interesting post. I hadn’t stopped to think, up to this point, how important it is to have no gaps between the outer person and the inner person. Those differences can be really harmful.
i also appreciate the recommendations on how to strengthen our self awareness. Setting and accomplishing goals is surely at the top of the list!
Julie Anne Byrne · September 24, 2019 at 3:40 pm
Hi Henry thanks for commenting and I agree it is very important that our inner and outer personas replicate each other for authenticity.
Wishing you the very best of luck, Julie Anne
Abayomi · September 24, 2019 at 3:01 am
Excellent article on self awareness, this is very important for one to discover early if he/she wants success in life and impact people.
It helps to know the strength, weakness, opportunity and threat and the vital point your post emphasized is positive thinking which is very cogent in self discovery.
I believe everyone needs to read this wonderful write-up in order to check if on the right track,thank you for sharing this awesome post.
Julie Anne Byrne · September 24, 2019 at 3:53 pm
Thanks for your comment and I am glad you enjoyed my post. All the best, Julie Anne