Each and every single one of us is capable of accomplishing great feats and achieving huge successes at things that really matter to us. And yet, so few of us succeed at elevating ourselves to the legendary status and becoming our “best self”. Ever wondered why that is?
Well, there are quite a few things that stop us from unlocking our most powerful self. For starters, laziness and procrastination are two things that affect almost all of us. Then, there’s fear. Fear can manifest itself in a lot of shapes; friends, family, colleagues, etc. Another reason is inexperience; a lot of people don’t really know what to do and what changes to make. In short, the list of reasons is pretty long.
But, like every other task, if we break down the task of becoming our best self into small steps, suddenly it becomes very doable. Of course, each person is unique and their concept of “best self” is unique as well but, there are a few tips that can help everyone get on their way to unlocking their most powerful self.
1. Expand Your knowledge
You can’t get anything done properly without the proper information and when it comes to becoming your best self, let’s just say you’re going to need a lot of knowledge for that.
Without knowledge, a person can never really learn how to think and how to assess everything, including themselves. And, if you don’t know how to think properly, how do you expect learn who you are?
Knowledge is something that one must pursue throughout their life. Books, documentaries, podcasts, informative videos, there is a vast ocean of content out there waiting to be discovered by you.
There is one good news for you though; you are here reading this post and, that means a part of you is already busy seeking knowledge. That’s a great sign.
2. Focus on Yourself
A big part of becoming your best self is going to involve not doing the things that lazy people do so commonly. From personal hygiene to fitness, you need to start getting things in order.
I’m not saying that you start following some crazy diet plan or start spending 6 hours a day in the gym. All I’m saying is “start small, increase slowly and maintain at the level that feels comfortable”. You certainly don’t need to work towards getting 6 pack abs if that’s not one of your priorities. Just focus on basic fitness.
Another part of getting things in order is to focus on your health. Have you been ignoring some kind of pain for a while? It’s time to get it looked at by a professional. And, when it comes to health you cannot ignore your mental health. If you suffer from stress, anxiety or any other issue, you need to find a way to effectively deal with it.
3. Learn to Value Your Time
Did you know that Leonardo da Vinci used polyphasic sleep? He used to take a 20 minutes nap every 4 hours. This allowed him to stay awake for 22 hours a day and he felt that the naps also boosted his creativity. That’s how much he valued time.
I am in no way suggesting that you start following this crazy sleep cycle; all I’m saying is that you need to start valuing your time more. Almost all of us waste a lot of time from the 16 hours that we’re awake. If we can limit that time wastage and spend the saved time on productive activities instead, we can get a lot more stuff done.
One trick you can use to start valuing time more is to start thinking of time as money. You get 86,400 seconds every day, be strict about where you spend that sum.
4. Discover Your Strengths and Weaknesses
This is one of the most important steps to follow when trying to unlock your best self. To find out what your strengths and weaknesses are, make a list of things and activities that interest you and the ones that scare you. Also, add important skills like communication, teamwork, public speaking, etc. to the list.
Now give each of these things a try and rate your performance on a scale of 1-10. You can also ask a friend or family member to help you with the scores. The items in which you did relatively well are the ones that you have a natural talent for, and the activities in which your performance wasn’t so great are your weaknesses.
Once you have your marks it’s time to arrange all the listed activities and skills in terms of their importance. And once you have that, it’s time to start working on the most important ones. You need to start working on improving the skills and activities most important to you (even if some of them are your natural strengths).
This activity will help make you invincible in areas where you’re already strong and it’ll also make you confident in areas where you were not so good in the beginning.
5. Set Goals for Yourself
We can’t really get anything significant done if we don’t plan for it ahead of time. This is why it is so important to set goals and constantly work towards them. When setting goals, it’s important to be very specific and highly detailed about your plans.
Here’s an example, let’s say I want to set up an online store. The goals that I need to set in order to achieve such a thing have to be very detailed. So, continuing our example, some of the goals I would set could be hiring a professional website development company, finding a reliable merchandise supplier, finding a warehouse, signing a distribution contract with a courier service, etc.
Basically, you need to come up with a highly detailed to-do list. And, each item on the list should have a deadline. Of course, situations change and your plans must adapt according to the situation so, don’t be too tough on yourself if you miss a few deadlines. They’re there only to provide that extra motivation.
6. Let Go of Bad Habits
Each person has a unique concept of good and bad so it’s entirely up to you which habits you think are bad and which ones you think are good. Any habit that you feel is having a negative effect on your life can be classified as a bad habit.
If you are to become your best self, you must find a way to break your bad habit. The thing about habits is that they can be addictive, so if you want to bre4ak a habit, you’ll need discipline. One of the techniques used to break habits is to replace your old and bad habit with a healthy one. This way, whenever you feel any urge, instead of fighting it off you can go and do something healthy instead.
So, using the aforementioned example, let’s suppose you want to invest in setting up an online store but you’re really bad at saving money. To deal with such a situation, what you can do is that every time you feel like going on a shopping spree or ordering something online, just put some money in your savings account instead.
