The Journey of Personal Transformation

What is Personal Transformation?

Personal transformation is a dynamic, individual process of expanding awareness so that you can become aware of the current you and start defining the new self-view. Then, choose to integrate these views into a revised self-definition.

An article in Psychology Today, posted on August 31, 2021, by Nina Ahuja BScHons, MD, FRCSC, CHE, states that personal transformation is a continual process. A positive outlook, a growth mindset, and introspection are all essential in helping you become a more robust and better version of yourself as you transform.

So, personal transformation is about improving yourself.

What do we need to do to reach our highest potential?

We need to take responsibility for our decisions and actions. The outcome will be personal satisfaction and a better quality of life.

"Life isn't about finding yourself. Life is about creating yourself." George Bernard Shaw

The Road to Transformation

  • Embrace change
    • Accepting and welcoming new situations, ideas, or ways of thinking without fear, resistance, or hesitation. It involves being open-minded. Expanding out of your comfort zone by exploring possibilities and opportunities.
  • Embrace resilience
    • Which is the ability to bounce back from setbacks, learn from failures, and adapt to new situations. Resilience empowers us to face challenges head-on, turning threats and challenges into opportunities.
  • Develop a Positive Mental Attitude
    • Self-dialogue is the discussion we have with ourselves. Develop positive self-talk. Become your own cheerleader. Have a pep rally on what is good about your life.
Beautifully colored butterfly - to symbolize our personal transformation.

Photo by Alfred Schrock on Unsplash

Articles & Blogs

Personal Transformation Is a Continual Process | Psychology Today

How to Become Self-Empowered, by Lisa Marie Bobby, Ph.D., LMFT, BCC

“Everything you want is just outside of your comfort zone.”

-Robert Allen

Conclusion

Transformation is a continuous process. It is not a quick fix; you must leave your comfort zone to grow. Who will you be tomorrow? What will the new version of you look like? Empowering personal transformation is not just a goal; it is a lifelong commitment to self-discovery, growth, and fulfillment. Take a journey of setting goals, building positive habits, and seeking support.

Through these actions, you will empower yourself to transform into who you want to be and design the life you want. Seeking to become the best version of yourself. Making a conscious decision to take charge of your destiny. Embracing change is a mindset that helps you navigate life’s transitions.

Give yourself permission to be in charge. Take Responsibility!

Recommended Reading

Flourish, by Martin E.P. Seligman

Mindset: How we can learn to fulfill our potential, by Dweck, Carol S., Ph.D.

Resolutions: Life Planning Tools, by Pilcher, Linda

#selfdiscovery, #Inspiring, #accountability, #selfgrowth, #selfrealization, #purpose, #destiny, #dreams, #goals, #improvement, #resilience

We Define Ourselves by the Choices We Make

We Define Ourselves by the Choices We Make

Every decision you make defines who you are. It takes work to become who you really want to be. If you live by default, without a plan, without understanding how your actions affect your future; you may end up somewhere you never wanted to be.

So how do we make better choices?

  • Awareness
  • Habits
  • Continuous Improvement Incrementally
  • Take Control – Zero Excuses!

Awareness

Awareness is vital. Becoming aware of our actions, the way we perform them, and the underlying motivations behind them. Subconscious habits dictate much of how we move through our day. In part, this is necessary, so that we can focus on more complex issues.

Awareness of habits, choices that we’re making, and the outcomes we want.

Habits

A lot of what we do in our lives is guided by habits that we have built over our lifetime. Many of these habits are unconscious, so we are performing tasks at this subconscious level without even really thinking about it. Have you ever driven to work, and then realized you do not remember the drive? The driving is on autopilot.

Habits are good for us because they help us get through our lives without putting huge amounts of mental and physical energy into completing every task.

However, there is a drawback to this because those habits are so strongly built into who we are. They dictate a lot about how we work our way through each day. Some habits are excellent for us and yet others, not so much. Changing your habits takes effort and time.

Continuous Improvement Incremental

Continuous Improvement Incrementally is enhancing and refining something gradually and steadily. Acknowledging there is always room for improvement, even if something is functioning well. It could enhance your skills, knowledge, or habits. Incrementally means taking small steps toward improvement. In self-development, this could be any aspect of your life where you feel you need to grow and improve.

By making changes incrementally, they are easier to implement, assess, and adapt to. Making changes over time can lead to significant positive outcomes.

Kaizen Philosophy: Continuous improvement incrementally aligns with the Kaizen philosophy, a Japanese term meaning “change for the better.” Kaizen emphasizes making small, continuous changes to improve efficiency and quality.

Personal Kaizen is the philosophy of life to change without being overwhelmed.

▷ Personal Kaizen, the philosophy of life to change without being overwhelmed (psychology-spot.com)

Take Control, Take Responsibility, Zero Excuses

Take control of your choices. Stop all the excuses. Who are you today? And who do you want to be tomorrow? What changes need to take place? The healthier you might mean, better food choices, and more movement. Looking at your life, ask what wellbeing means. A more work-life balance might look like taking more time to be with your family; not living for the job.

Take responsibility. It is not someone else’s responsibility to make your decisions. Taking responsibility means your health, education, job, financial, and career choices. It also means choices about your behavior and how you spend your free time.

No excuses, we often are the limiting element in our lives. You either have a mindset of I can, or I can’t.

Art by John Hain from Pixabay

Everything is a Choice

Life is a series of choices and our decisions shape who we are. Acknowledging that every action allows individuals to consciously define their path.

We can correct our course

Life is complex. We need to work out a plan. We can float, day by day, unconsciously doing the same thing repeatedly, hoping for a different ending. Or we can take control of our destiny and become the person we really want to be.                               

Some of our choices can be like a brick wall in front of us — one so high we cannot climb over the wall. Yes, some people manage to have plans A, B, C, D, and Z if needed. They find a ladder and climb over the wall, take a sledgehammer, and break the wall, dig a hole underneath it, or just walk around the side of the wall. Meaning we can live in a self-imposed box or break out and take responsibility for our choices. No excuses.

How to define yourself before others do it for you | LinkedIn

We can choose to be healthy, to get up early, to get eight hours of sleep. If we choose not to do these things, we have defined our path.

“Our lives are fashioned by our choices. First, we make our choices. Then our choices make us.”

– Anne Frank.

Conclusion

We are all that we experience. Everything is a choice. Pay attention and be aware of what you’re doing throughout your day. Have a bigger plan. Visualize the bigger picture so that you can understand how today’s actions impact future outcomes.

Success is built on daily choices and activities, usually in small steps. Again, I will repeat that continuous improvement incrementally is a way to start making those changes.

Habits are our comfortable place and when we’re stressed, tired, or lazy, we fall back on those habits. Changing those habits takes time, it takes effort, and awareness. But you can change your habits. Some people make radical transformations in their life but that’s usually based on incremental changes.

I invite you to embrace a philosophy of taking responsibility for who you are today, and who you will be tomorrow, with zero excuses. As Nike’s tagline says, “Just Do It.” You have the power within you to change your life to the life you really want.

Recommended Reading

·         Kaizen: The Japanese Secret to Lasting Change—Small Steps to Big Goals, by Harvey, Sarah.

·         The 7 Habits of Highly Effective People, by Covey, Stephen R.

#habits, #awreness, #continuousimprovement, #definingyourself, #habitbuilding, #kaizen, #whoami

Redefine Your Story: Why Start Now Paves the Way to New Beginnings

Why start now?

And where do you start?
Every journey has a designated starting point. Changing your life, setting goals, planning a vacation. Sometimes it’s hard to determine what the starting point is, and how do I get from A to B. Developing a plan of action is a good starting point. Looking at the bigger picture. What is it you want to accomplish? What steps are involved, and what is your timeline?

“The stories we tell ourselves about ourselves determine the quality of the selves we imagine we are.”

—Rami M. Shapiro

Everyone tells themselves a story about who they are and what they are worth. However, the stories you tell yourself are instrumental in setting the course and deciding how far you will go in life. DrRooplen.com, Personal Development Blog, gives you five tips to change the stories you tell yourself.

Stories are the way we make sense of our lives.

As humans, we like to listen to stories. Storytelling has been a way of passing down our history, and our culture’s information about our world. So, think of your plan of action as your story. What story do you want to tell? Do you want to accomplish some specific tasks or improve your physical health?

A good plan of action can be developed by asking questions. The 5W’s have always been my starting point.

Who
What
When
Where
Why

Examine your life. Become aware of what you are thinking, feeling, and doing. Humans have great potential to change our lifestyles, behaviors, and habits. It starts with becoming aware of where you are now – AND – where you want to go. Where you are today is your starting point, the beginning of your story; it is up to you to define the next chapter in your personal story.

Take out a piece of paper. I am encouraging you to use paper and pen, as you can carry them around with you, make changes, and create a picture for your starting point. The blog on this website will talk more about visualization and self-dialogue. Keep an eye out for more to come.

Now let me add another dimension to this post: continuous improvement, incrementally. People often get overwhelmed because they look at the big picture and think it is too much; overwhelming. If instead, you look at the big picture and start breaking it down into smaller components.

Step 1 – Learn a new skill – Define what you want to lean
Step 2 – Determine what your current skills are and what is the gap; what do you need to learn the new skill? It might be an online class, a YouTube tutorial video, or a book on the subject. Something that can help you learn this new skill. What is it?
Step 3 – Implementation. How will you make this plan become a reality?

Write a poem
Write a book
Get a new job
Go back to school
 What is it you want to add to your story?

Then you tackle the task incrementally, a little at a time. Especially when changing aspects of your story. It does not have to be rushed. Let’s say you are going to change your weight. Do not go on a radical stop eating a diet that makes you miserable; and will not work in the long run. Plan on changing your diet incrementally. One week, take something out of your diet that is unhealthy. One item at a time. Get used to the idea that you do not need that food item.

Yes, I have followed this practice and radically changed my lifestyle, nutritional intake, and exercise routines. One small step at a time. Sometimes it took me months to wean myself from something I loved that was bad for me.  

Closing Notes

How changing your story can change your life – Lori Gottlieb Ted Talk
How changing your story can change your life | Lori Gottlieb – YouTube

Join me in

A Movement Toward Improvement

Who am I?

Just a puppet on a string

To dance and sing

And make them laugh

A game called survive

Put her down

See how long she lives

Till she dies

A dream

Only to disappear

When they awaken

The mind of a single thought

One word of an infinite song

Who Am I?

Just a puppet on a string?

I wrote this poem when I was sixteen years old. My personal pilgrimage had just started. My guides were self-help books, ancient philosophers, and current psychologists; who taught me how to improve. Today, I am no longer that lost little girl; I am a woman who knows her strengths and weaknesses, knows what I want from life, and how to achieve my goals.

What Defines Me?                                                                                     

This question is personal and deep; it involves a lifetime of likes and dislikes, passions, visions, hopes, plans, and dreams. Is it my perspective of me that defines me or others’ perspectives of me? I vote for my perspective, yet that does not make it true. 

Yes, we are influenced by others.

What does your mother see when she looks into your eyes?

  • Your significant other
  • Your children
  • Your co-workers
  • Church community
  • Teachers
  • Your best friend

The chances are that each person sees a different you. The attributes they know. No one really knows us, but I also feel we do not fully know ourselves. We put on masks for different roles that hid parts of ourselves from others and sometimes ourselves. So we are going to take a journey seeking to define “Who am I.” 

On our journey, we are seeking what is true; what is real? We are looking for our authentic selves. The problem with this is we are the architecture of this self. The truth is that we are complex creatures. Part of our identity is created by where we are born, our family’s biological traits, culture and religion, and worldview. Then a part of our identity is defined by us – we have the ability to design who we become.

So let me answer a few questions about why I am blogging instead of keeping a personal journal.

I have kept a personal journal since I was 16. My pilgrimage on the search for self has been lifelong. At this time, I want to bring others who are seeking on this journey.

The main question will be, “Who am I? It would help if you answered these questions in-depth as you start your journey.

I will be writing about self-insight, self-growth, self-improvement, and reaching your highest level of human potential. I want to connect to people who want to grow in a direction that is progressive, people who want to be better humans.

My goal is to build a community of like-minded individuals who want a better life, a better world.

Who am I? I am an artist, writer, businesswoman, wife, mother, grandmother, sister, friend, neighbor. It is my responsibility to be the best at each role I hold.