why people being bad nowadays but still trying being improve

Self Improvement And Personal Developments

A desire for self-improvement, leading us to better our lives, is one of our Six Human Needs. No matter what you’re pursuing, self-improvement is a critical part of your progress and happiness. But all too often our efforts at self-improvement fail. We aren’t sure which direction to head in, so we end up stumbling around hoping we’ll just

• Let's define self-improvement. The definition of self-improvement is pretty self-explanatory: Self-improvement is the improvement of one's knowledge, status, or character by one's own efforts. It's the quest to make ourselves better in any and every facet of life.

• Self-Improvement Tips On How To Better Yourself This Year :-

• 1. SET GOALS FOR YOURSELF

  Get into the habit of setting goals for yourself: yearly, monthly, and even daily when you can. Write those goals down. Come back to them and record your progress. Success isn’t in how quickly you achieve your goals, or even if you actually do achieve them – it’s in the journey to make them happen.

• But How To Set Goals:-

• 1. 1
     Determine your life goals. Ask yourself some important questions about what you want for your life. What do you want to achieve: today, in a year, in your lifetime? The answers to this question can be as general as "I want to be happy," or "I want to help people."^[1] Consider what you hope to attain 10, 15, or 20 years from now.

     • A career life goal might be to open your own business. A fitness goal might be to become fit. A personal goal might be to have a family one day. These goals can be incredibly broad.
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     Break the big picture down into smaller and more specific goals.^[2] Consider areas of your life that you either want to change or that you feel you would like to develop with time. Areas might include: career, finances, family, education, or health. Begin to ask yourself questions about what you'd like to achieve in each area and how you would like to approach it within a five year time frame.^[3]

     • For the life goal “I want to be fit,” you might make the smaller goals “I want to eat more healthily” and “I want to run a marathon.”^[4]
     • For the life goal “I want to open my own business,” the smaller goals may be “I want to learn to manage a business effectively” and “I want to open an independent book store.”

  1. • store.”
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     Write goals for the short term. Now that you know roughly what you want to accomplish within a few years, make concrete goals for you to begin working on now.^[5] Give yourself a deadline within a reasonable time frame (no more than a year for short-term goals).

     • Writing your goals will make them harder to ignore, consequently making you accountable for them.
     • To become fit, your first goals may be to eat more vegetables and to run a 5k.
     • To open your own business, your first goals may be to take a bookkeeping class and to find the perfect location for your bookstore.
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     Make your goals smaller steps that move you towards larger life goals. Basically, you need to decide why you're setting this goal for yourself and what it will accomplish.^[6] Some good questions to ask yourself when figuring this out are: does it seem worthwhile? Is now the right time for this? Does this match my needs?^[7]

     • For example, while a short-term fitness goal might be to take up a new sport within six months, ask yourself if that will help you reach your bigger goal of running a marathon. If not, consider changing the short term goal to something that will be a step towards meeting the life goal.
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     Adjust your goals periodically. You may find yourself set in your ways concerning broad life goals, but take the time to re-evaluate your smaller goals. Are you accomplishing them according to your time frame? Are they still necessary to keep you on track towards your larger life goals? Allow yourself the flexibility to adjust your goals.^[8]

     • To become fit, you may have mastered running 5K races. Perhaps after you have run a few and worked on improving your personal best times, you should adjust your goal from “run a 5K” to “run a 10K.” Eventually you can move to “run a half marathon,” then “run a marathon.”
     • To open your own business, after completing the first goals of taking a bookkeeping class and finding a location, you may set new goals to obtain a business loan to purchase a space and to apply for the proper business licensing through your local government. Afterwards, you can move towards buying (or leasing) the space, then obtaining the books you need, hiring staff, and opening your doors to business. Eventually you may even work towards opening a second location!

  Method2

  Practicing Effective Goal Strategies

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     Make your goals specific. When setting goals, they should answer the highly specific questions of who, what, where, when, and why. For each specific goal you make, you should ask yourself why it is a goal and how it helps your life goals.^[9]

     • To become fit (which is very general), you have created the more specific goal “run a marathon,” which begins with the short-term goal “run a 5K.” When you set each short-term goal—such as running a 5K, you can answer the questions: Who? Me. What? Run a 5K. Where? At Local Park. When? In 6 weeks. Why? To work towards my goal of running a marathon.
     • To open your own business, you have created the short-term goal “take a bookkeeping class.” This can answer the questions: Who? Me. What? Take a bookkeeping class. Where? At the Library. When? Every Saturday for 5 weeks. Why? To learn how to manage a budget for my business.
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     Create measurable goals.^[10] In order for us to track our progress, goals should be quantifiable. "I'm going to walk more" is far more difficult to track and measure than "Every day I'm going to walk around the track 16 times." Essentially, you'll need a few ways of determining if you're reaching your goal.^[11]

     • “Run a 5K” is a measurable goal. You know for certain when you have done it. You may need to set the even shorter-term goal of “run at least 3 miles (4.8 km), 3 times every week” to work towards your first 5K. After your first 5K, a measurable goal would be “run another 5K in one month, but take 4 minutes off of my time.”
     • Likewise, “take a bookkeeping class” is measurable because it is a specific class that you will sign up to take and go to every week. A less measurable version would be “learn about bookkeeping,” which is vague because it’s difficult to know when you’re “finished” learning about bookkeeping.
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     Be realistic with your goals. It is important to evaluate your situation honestly and recognize which goals are realistic and which are a little far-fetched. Ask yourself if you have the all the things you need to complete your goal (skill, resources, time, knowledge).^[12]

     • To become fit and run a marathon, you will need to spend a lot of time running. If you do not have the time or interest to devote many hours every week to running, this goal may not work for you. If you find this is the case, you could adjust your goals; there are other ways to become fit that do not involve spending hours and hours running.
     • If you want to open your own independent bookstore but you have no experience running a business, have no capital (money) to put towards opening the business, and you have no knowledge about how bookstores work, or you’re not really interested in reading, you may not be successful in achieving your goals.
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     Set priorities. At any given moment, you have a number of goals all in different states of completion. Deciding which goals are more important or time-sensitive than others is crucial. If you find yourself with too many goals, you're going to feel overwhelmed and are less likely to accomplish them.^[13]

     • It may help to choose a few top priorities. This will provide you focus when conflicting goals come up. If it's a choice between completing one or two minor goals and completing one top priority, you know to choose the top priority.^[14]
     • If you’re working towards becoming fit and you have set the smaller goals “to eat more healthily,” “to run a 5K,” and “to swim 1 mile (1.6 km), 3 days per week,” you may find that you do not have the time or energy to do all of those things at once. You can prioritize; if you want to run a marathon, first running a 5K may be more important to your goal than swimming every week. You may want to continue eating better, because that is good for your overall health in addition to helping you run.
     • If you’re working towards opening your own bookstore, you may need to obtain a business license and be sure you can qualify for a business loan (if you need one) before you begin selecting specific books to carry in your store.
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     Keep track of your progress. Writing in a journal is a great way to keep track of both personal and professional progress. Checking in with yourself and acknowledging the progress made towards a certain goal is key to staying motivated. It may even encourage you to work harder.

     • Asking a friend to keep you on track can help you stay focused. For example, if you're training for the big race, having a friend to regularly meet up with and work out with can keep you on track with your progress.
     • If you are getting fit by working towards a marathon, keep a running journal in which you record how far you ran, how much time it took, and how you felt. As you improve more and more, it can be a great confidence boost to go back and see how far you’ve come since you started.
     • It may be a bit more difficult to track your progress towards opening your own business, but writing down all of your goals and sub-goals, then crossing them out or indicating when each one is complete can help you track the work that you’ve done.
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     Assess your goals. Acknowledge when you have reached goals and allow yourself to celebrate accordingly. Take this time to assess the goal process—from inception to completion. Consider if you were happy with the time frame, your skill set, or if the goal was reasonable.

     • For example, once you have run your first 5K, be grateful that you've completed a goal, even if it seems small one in comparison to your bigger goal of running a marathon.^[15]
     • Of course, when you open the doors of your independent bookstore and you make your first sale to a customer, you’ll celebrate, knowing that you have worked towards your goal successfully!
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     Keep setting goals. Once you have achieved goals—even major life goals—you will want to continue to grow and set new goals for yourself.

     • Once you run your marathon, you should assess what you’d like to do next. Do you want to run another marathon, but improve your time? Do you want to diversify and try a triathlon or an Ironman race? Or do you want to go back to running shorter distance races—5Ks or 10Ks?
     • If you have opened your independent bookstore, do you want to work on implementing community events, such as book clubs or literacy tutoring? Or do you want to make more money? Would you like to open additional locations or expand by adding a coffee shop inside or next door to your bookstore?

   

  2. BE THANKFUL FOR WHAT YOU HAVE

  It’s difficult to focus on self-improvement when you fail to recognise what you already have in life. Take time out of your day to sit and reflect on what you have, where you are, and how you get here.

  Being thankful for the here and now is the first step to bettering yourself for the future.

• How To  Be ThankFul For What You Have ? Click ISIS Group Details

• • Keep a Gratitude Journal. Establish a daily practice in which you remind yourself of the gifts, benefits and good things you enjoy.
  • Remember the Bad. To be grateful in your current state, it is helpful to remember the hard times that you once experienced.
  • Learn Prayers of Gratitude. In many spiritual traditions, prayers of gratitude are considered to be the most powerful form of prayer, because through these prayers people recognize the ultimate source.
• 
  
  
• Come to Your Senses. Through our senses—the ability to touch, see, smell, taste, and hear—we gain an appreciation of what it means to be human and of what an incredible ...
• Use Visual Reminders. Because the two primary obstacles to gratefulness are forgetfulness and a lack of mindful awareness, visual reminders can serve as cues to trigger thoughts of gratitude.

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• 3. MOVE!

  Exercise and self-improvement go hand-in-hand, doing wonderful things for both your body and your mind. Find a form of movement you love – whether that’s dancing around your living room, lifting weights at the gym or hiking mountains all day long.

• 
  
  

  • Method 1 of 3: Dealing with Past Hurts. Acknowledge your feelings without judging them. If you’re feeling bad about something, trying to ignore your emotions won’t make them go away.

  • Method 2 of 3: Changing Your Thinking. Examine the reasons that you feel stuck. ...

  • Method 3 of 3: Getting Out of a Rut. Set some SMART goals for yourself. ...

  
  

• 4. BE KINDER TO YOURSELF

  You only get one body, so be kind to it. Have you ever heard someone ask, ‘if you spoke to your friends how you speak to yourself, what would your reaction be?’

  For a lot of people, they’d be appalled – and that’s night right. Be kind. Love. Breathe.

• 
  
  

  1. Carve Out Some Time For Yourself. Every day carve out some time for yourself and do something that brings you joy. You can draw, journal, write short stories, play a musical instrument, or do anything else that you love to do. Be kind to yourself by giving yourself some “me time” each day.

  2. Give Yourself Recognition. Often, we’re quick to acknowledge the achievements of others, but slow to acknowledge our own. That has to stop. Become aware of your own achievements and give yourself recognition.

  When you do something you’re proud of, stop for a minute and dwell on it. Praise yourself and relish the achievement. Complement yourself. Pat yourself on the back and say the following: “Kudos to me!”

  3. Cultivate Your Inner Advocate. We’re all familiar with the inner critic. It’s that little voice in our heads that’s quick to judge and is always ready with a put down. Well, it’s time for your inner critic to meet your inner advocate.

  And who exactly is this inner advocate? It’s another voice in your head: the one that defends you. When your inner critic comes at you with ridicule and scorn, your inner advocate jumps in and presents arguments on your behalf. While your inner critic is against you, your inner advocate is for you.

  Be kind to yourself by cultivating your inner advocate (mine wears Armani suits and carries a black leather Gucci brief case).

  4. Forgive Yourself. We all mess up. Look at the following:

  • Maybe you did something in the past that you’re not proud of.
  • Perhaps you failed to stand up for yourself and you let someone else get the better of you.
  • You may have missed a great opportunity because you got scared.
  • Maybe you failed to follow through on an important goal.

  If you’re angry at yourself, you need to show yourself kindness: stop blaming yourself, resolve to do better from now on, and forgive yourself.

  5. Take Good Care of Yourself. One of the best ways to show yourself kindness is to take good care of yourself. Get enough sleep, eat fruits and vegetables, and get some form of exercise on a regular basis. In addition, choose a way to release stress, be well groomed, and look after your appearance.

  6. Respect Yourself. Self-respect is valuing yourself for who you are, and not allowing others to dictate your value. It’s trusting yourself, thinking for yourself, forming your own opinions, and making your own decisions. In addition, it’s refusing to compare yourself to others.

  Finally, self-respect is about keeping your promises to yourself and following through on what you tell yourself that you’re going to do. Be kind to yourself by deeply respecting yourself.

  7. Treat Yourself. I’m not advocating shopping therapy, or consumerism. However, if you see something that you really want, treat yourself. If it’s expensive, save up for it. You don’t have to wait for someone else to give it to you as a gift. Give it to yourself. (You get bonus points if you get the shop to wrap it in colorful gift wrap.)

  8. Soothe Yourself. Did you have a tough day? Did you get into an argument with a co-worker or a friend? Did you bomb your presentation? Was it one of those days in which everything that could wrong, did go wrong? Be kind to yourself by soothing yourself. Do the following:

  • Soak in a hot tub. Add scented bath oil.
  • Give yourself a scalp massage. Rub your feet.
  • Make yourself some hot cocoa with little marshmallows in it and sit back with a mystery novel.
  • Lock your bedroom door, turn on some music, and dance around in your underwear.

  After all, nobody knows how to soothe you better than you.

  9. Remind Yourself of Your Good Qualities. Maybe you’re a little heavier than “the ideal body type”, but you have long, lustrous hair. Maybe you’re not great at sports, but you’re an ace at math. Maybe you have a tendency to be melodramatic, but you have a great sense of humor.
  Always remind yourself of your good qualities.

  

  10. Lift Yourself Up. When you fail, make a mistake, or do something wrong, you have two choices. You can tear yourself down, or you can lift yourself up. People who are kind to themselves choose the latter.

  Tell yourself it’s going to be OK. Give yourself a morale boost by reminding yourself of your past successes. Then, come up with a plan for dealing with what happened, and take action.

  11. Tell Yourself, “I Am Enough”. We’ve all had times in our lives when we’ve thought, “I’m not good looking enough, or smart enough, or strong enough to get what I want.” Stop it with the “I’m not enough” self-talk and replace it with the following;

  • “I’m enough, just as I am.”
  • “I’m worthy.”
  • “I deserve to be happy.”
  • “I deserve to have everything I want.”

  In addition, tell yourself that nothing has to happen to make you worthy. You are already enough.

  12. Honor Your Dreams. People who respect themselves–people who are kind to themselves–honor their dreams. That is, they don’t downplay their dreams by labeling them as silly fantasies. Instead, they take their dreams seriously by turning those dreams into goals, and creating a plan for achieving those goals.

  13. Find the Sweet Spot Between Acceptance and Striving. Part of being kind to yourself is acknowledging your potential. As was stated in the previous point, you should know what you want and go after it. However, never being satisfied with where you are, or with what you have achieved so far in life, is being unkind to yourself.

  Be kind to yourself by finding the sweet spot between being happy with who you are, while taking action to become even better.

  14. Stop Trying to Be Perfect. People who set a standard of perfection for themselves are setting themselves up for failure. After all, perfection is unachievable. Can you think of anything more unkind than making success impossible for yourself?

  Instead of setting a standard of “perfection” for yourself, aim to improve, one step at a time.

  15. Show Yourself Compassion. In the book, How to Be Your Own Best Friend by Mildred Newman and Bernard Berkowitz, the authors recommend that you befriend yourself by showing yourself compassion. The best way to feel compassion for yourself is to imagine that someone you love is feeling hurt. Look at the following:

  • What would you say to them?
  • How would you treat them?
  • How would you reassure them?
  • How would you make them feel cared for and loved?

  Now, do that for yourself — show yourself compassion.

  16. Believe In Yourself. Part of being kind to yourself is wanting the best for yourself. And in order to get the best, you have to believe in yourself. Have faith in your own abilities and in your own judgment. Think highly of yourself: believe in yourself.

  17. Accept Yourself. Accept yourself as you are. You have strengths, and you have weaknesses. Sometimes you succeed, and sometimes you fail. Sometimes you’re right, and sometimes you’re wrong. Allow yourself to fully be who you are.

• 5. READ A BOOK

  “A reader lives a thousand lives before he dies. The man who never reads lives only one.” – George R.R. Martin

  I can never, never, understand when people tell me ‘they don’t like reading’. To me, it’s like saying you don’t like eating. There are books for everyone – from fantasy and science fiction to biographies and self-help books.

  Reading opens your mind, let’s you inside the mind of another person (even if they are fictional), and can challenge you in ways you never imagined. If you do one thing to improve yourself, pick up a book today and read it.

• 
1. Get comfortable. When I’m having trouble focusing on a book I want to be reading and I can’t figure out why, I do some body scanning.
2. Remove distractions. Assuming that you do have a problem with getting distracted by things, see if you can remove them. ...
3. Try an e-reader. Money permitting, e-readers (or e-reading apps on phones) can really help. ...
4. If you have to drive a lot, try audiobooks. Personally, I dislike receiving information in audio format, but some people say this works for them, especially when they have ...
5.  Try reading something easier/simpler/more fun, at least at first. A lot of people say they have trouble motivating themselves to read books, but what they really mean is Big ...

6. FORGIVE YOUR PAST MISTAKES

Own up to your past mistakes, acknowledge them, and then forgive them. Getting hung up on the past will get you nowhere – but so will hiding your past from your future. 

When we see or hear the word forgiveness, there’s always a solemn and heavy feeling swirling around the topic. Although, we shouldn’t be sad or solemn because the very act of forgiving is so powerful and uplifting. It’s what allows us to grow and move forward in life after a great atrocity. However, there is an inherent difficulty when it comes to learning how to forgive yourself for past mistakes. A true act of forgiveness is one of the most spiritually enlightening and soul advancing processes we all can participate in.

The act of self-forgiveness follows similar steps to grieving. In order to forgive yourself for past mistakes, you’ll need to work through the emotional steps of (1) acknowledgement (2) acceptance (3) love and (4) release. Love is the key step in this process. It is the line of demarcation that separates the pain and suffering from the emotional and spiritual guidance and healing. Once you can learn how to love yourself (and others) again, it will be easier to cross the invisible threshold of forgiveness.

Learning how to forgive yourself for past mistakes may seem like a daunting and difficult task. It may take a lot of courage to face our own past mishaps and misgivings. But once you experience forgiveness and arrive on the other side of it, life takes on new meaning. And the very next act of forgiveness will be that much easier and welcomed. You will be forgiving over and over again. You will be so happy that you’ve learned how to forgive because it is the most transformative spiritual act you and partake in.

What Is Forgiveness? Definition

The definition of forgiveness is the emotional release of a past blame or hurt as a result of misconduct either by you or someone else. Often times the negative emotion you are trying to relieve is a combination of anger, frustration, guilt, and assigning fault or blame for a past wrongdoing, violation, or misbehavior. Many people find forgiveness the most difficult of gracious human acts to carry out.

What forgiveness is to the average person is viewed differently from the spiritually inclined person. Forgiveness to the average person seems like ‘doing a favor’ to the other person who wronged them. By forgiving them it seems as though you’re letting them off of the hook too easily. However, to the spiritually aware, forgiveness is a way of shedding an undue burden. Freeing yourself from this oppressive weight is crucial to spiritual growth.

Forgiveness for the spiritually aware person is a welcomed enterprise. Learning how to forgive yourself for past mistakes is a part of this journey. Forgiveness is a quick and easy lesson for those learning how to become more spiritually aware. This act of opening up your heart, releasing the pain, and allowing heart energy to heal your soul is penetrating and has resounding effects on you and your life. Forgiveness allows you to learn how to have peace in your heart.

Once you learn how to attract love energy, the act of forgiving will become much easier. Forgiveness also opens your connection to the Universe. You’ll learn how to receive cosmic energy because of your relationship with love, the strongest force in the Universe. Fundamentally, learning how to forgive requires a fundamental shift in mindset. Learning how to shift your mindset will be the difference between absolute blissful freedom and self-imposed suffering. In either case, you have full control.

How Forgiveness Works Spiritually

The little known benefit to forgiveness is that it improves YOUR LIFE more than the person you are forgiving. It’s a misnomer and a falsity that the other person truly benefits. Understand that once you fully forgive someone, it is YOU who are benefiting THE MOST. And if you’re learning how to forgive yourself for past mistakes, then you’re receiving twice the benefits.

Why is this so? Because the pain, anguish, and hurt you are feeling is EMOTIONAL WEIGHT. Although, you may think that’s not a big deal, it is a big deal on the spiritual level. When you hold a grudge, or you are depressed, or you are perpetually envious, angry, or sad, all of that negative energy is weight which is holding you down.

It is holding you back from emotional and spiritual progress. It is stopping you from emotional and spiritual growth. It is stopping you from becoming one with The Creator, which is our goal with enlightenment.

All of that emotional weight stays with you and sits on the Emotional plane. It weighs down your aura and your soul. It is literally EMOTIONAL BAGGAGE. And you can choose to release it or you can choose to hold on to it. Which do you choose?

One way will uplift and bring you closer to spiritual awakening and contentment. The other will leave you miserable and only invite more misery into your life. The choice is clear and simple. Forgive and move on.

Forgiveness is reciprocal in nature. The person who is trying to forgive (or in the process of forgiving) receives the most benefit. People often misunderstand the reciprocal nature of how forgiveness works. The request for forgiveness can be from yourself to yourself or to someone else, or from another person to you. Forgiveness works on several spiritual levels, planes, or dimensions.

When you forgive, you realign with Universal Intelligence (or the Universal Mind). You make peace and reassume your place in the world (and Universe). Forgiveness is a deeply spiritual act that is often tied to karma. If you are having trouble forgiving, it is very likely that you had this difficulty in a past life and it’s a lesson you must learn in this one. So in order to escape this cyclical karmic lesson, learn to forgive – and fast, so that you are not doomed with this in the next life. Forgiving will only serve you.

What Forgiveness Means

What does forgiveness really mean? It is the ability to remove all past hurt, pain, or any malicious feelings or ill will from a particular person or situation. It’s your ability to release all discontent with the situation that occurred and move on. This is crucial. You must be able to move on and no longer be emotionally tied to the previous issue. You leave the situation to God, Divinity, Infinite Intelligence, Source, The Creator, or whatever you may call it, to handle.

Does Forgiveness Mean Reconciliation?

It’s important to understand what reconciliation means on a spiritual level versus an emotional or in this case a physical level. To reconcile a relationship (on a human physical level) means that you reestablish the relationship or that you restart or revive the relationship. You try and bring the relationship back to life. So in this example, reconciliation is purely about the previous human-based relationship – a marriage, partnership, or short or long-term relationship.

However, forgiveness (as opposed to reconciliation) is about you, your feelings and emotions, and your ability to let go of the past indiscretion and move on. Forgiveness does not have to be about resurrecting the relationship or bringing back. You could forgive and move on, never looking back at the relationship.

You can choose to move on to greener pastures, either by spending some time by yourself or by starting fresh. But understand that reconciling is not a necessary part of forgiveness. You can move on and never look back and that is okay. That may just be your path.

True forgiveness means that you’ve come to terms with the situation, you realize you cannot change the past, and you need to heal and move on. Although you do not condone what happened, you are not willing to let it affect your happiness and your valuable time and life on this Earth.

So with forgiveness you are accepting it, no longer resenting what happened (or resenting the person) and instead relent. Forgiveness is relenting not resenting.

What Does Forgiveness Look Like?

There are two angles to view forgiveness. One angle is from the side of wanting to forgive, but not knowing how. This is the angle that most people approach forgiving. Most end up lost and paralyzed in confusion and indecision because of having to manage several competing emotions. From this perspective, forgiveness seems like an impossible feat. You have to forgive. You need to forgive in order to truly understand how to have peace in your heart.

The other angle to view forgiveness is from a vantage point of complete acceptance and serenity. From this position, you have finally come to terms with forgiveness. You feel in harmony with your world and your environment again. And now that you have forgiven, you see how much peace it adds to your life. You can view your life from a place of gratitude. You know how to be grateful for everything in your life. You make a point to choose happiness.

The route to forgiveness can be a short one or a long one depending on what you choose. And once you do finally learn how to forgive yourself for past mistakes (or others for their mistakes), it becomes a familiar road, one that is easy to navigate. Forgiveness becomes more familiar and easier to do in the future.

Ironically, once you learn how to forgive you have less need to do it because you’ve learned your spiritual lesson. You have learned how to become more spiritually aware just by simply learning to forgive. You’ve crossed that chasm and you’ll never need to turn back.

7. ADMIT YOUR WEAKNESSES

Again, own up to and acknowledge your weaknesses. What do you really need to improve on?

You could be bad at budgeting, contacting your friends and family, looking after yourself, or multiple things. Admit your weaknesses to be able to improve upon them.

The journey towards gaining respect begins the moment we recognize our mistakes and have the integrity and fortitude to admit we were wrong.

From many years of interviewing candidates, I have learned that the key answer to the questions about “qualities” are not the ones that ask candidates to name what strengths they have to do the position well, but rather are the ones that ask them about their weaknesses. How well a candidate answers the weakness question tells you a lot about who they are and what integrity and fortitude they have as it takes strength of character to admit weakness and intelligence to identify it. It is thus the case that one of the biggest strengths people can have is the capacity to understand and recognize our own weaknesses. This self reflection and honesty about difficulties and struggles we have naturally leads onto the ability to work on and improve in or make up for weaknesses, a vital skill in the work place. Ownership of weaknesses and mistakes is one of the key parts of the inside out mentality.

Recognizing ones own weaknesses is one of the biggest strengths you can have.

A great leader is not an infallible machine, they are merely a fallible human being striving to perform at the best of their abilities. Performing at the best of your abilities will not come without mistakes, they are part of the process. How we deal with mistakes is however a vital part of having the correct leadership character and plays a key role in inspiring those around you. The willingness to admit your weaknesses and your vulnerabilities is very powerful in leadership when done correctly. You can gain strength by admitting your faults to yourself and your peers. When you admit it, you make it a part of what we share as information about ourselves and encourage a culture of honesty. A weakness expressed becomes a manageable challenge to overcome. You put into action a process, be that self learning and self improvement or assistance from others who may have a strength where you have weakness and have the capacity to support you in that area.

Admitting a weakness can turn a possible excuse into potential progress.

Likewise the capacity to admit you were wrong is vital in leadership. However so often in leadership inexperienced or poor managers believe that admitting they were wrong shows weakness or ineptness. The danger of that belief, especially when it is held by people in positions of power or authority, is that it backs a leader into defending their poor choices, even when they themselves may have come to recognize they were wrong. These managers often intentionally or not end up placing false blame on others in order to prove that they were right. In their minds they see this as a way to save face, or prove they are deserving of their power, or retain respect for their intelligence. Sadly, they don’t accomplish any of those things. In fact, they accomplish the exact opposite as the best employees in any organization will inevitably recognize when mistakes have been made, and they also see when a manager is covering their own tracks. They ultimately lose respect, trust, and confidence in the manager, and more often than not, they will jump ship at the first opportunity that comes along to work in a better environment.

Managers who never admit mistakes usually lose the respect of their staff.

True leaders recognize the value of taking a percentage of the blame and see mistakes as both something to be learned from and an opportunity to reconnect with team members and/or with team values. By admitting a mistake to staff, you can show yourself to be human and give you and them a chance to reconnect both emotionally and professionally. This moment of honesty in saying “you were wrong” encourages them to do the same and makes it easier to together find the win/win, third way of agreement. Likewise by being honest about the cause of the mistake you can give yourself the opportunity to lead your team towards doing things differently and better the second time around. Trust – the vital part of effective team work – doesn’t come from creating a false aura of infallibility and perfection, it rather is built from the foundation of integrity and fortitude and the capacity to say you were wrong and admit a weakness is an integral part of this. Admitting mistakes and saying “sorry i was wrong” is a strength not a weakness.

8. GET OUT YOUR COMFORT ZONE 

Do something new that challenges you and makes you feel uncomfortable. Shake things up. Make new and unpredictable situations your new normal.

Step #1 – Get Information

Anxiety usually comes from a fear of the unknown. Usually we imagine the worst-case scenario of what could happen when we push past the boundaries of what makes us feel safe.

To break through your comfort zone, you need to first educate yourself. Your goal here is to find out about whatever skill or activity you’re pursuing. You’ll talk to people who have done the same thing. You’ll read books on the subject. And you’ll check-out articles on the Internet about this subject.

Information is power. And the more you know about something, the less scary and more powerful you’ll feel.

Example: Taking the example from the introduction, if you want to be an expert salesperson then your goal is to become comfortable with cold-calling. So you’ll talk to top sales people and learn what they did to overcome this obstacle. Then you’ll educate yourself about the process and the tricks that other people have used.

Step #2 – Have a Plan

After educating yourself, you want to create a plan of action for pushing the boundaries on what you think is possible. 

With this step you’re going to write down a step-by-step blueprint for how you’re going to get out of your comfort zone. You start with the easiest thing to do. Then you create a plan to get to each level.In this plan you need to create benchmarks. These are mini-goals that put you one step close to pushing past your comfort zone.

Furthermore, it’s important to identify the key challenges you’re going to face and what you’ll do to overcome them.

Example: Back to the sales job. Once you’ve learned about the cold-calling process, you’ll sit down and create a plan for overcoming this limitation. Perhaps you would start with people you already know and work your way up to cold-calling prospects that are considered ‘dead leads.’

Step #3 – Hold Yourself Accountable

Accountability is another key to breaking through your comfort zone. You want to tell your friends and family about what you’re trying to do.  Or you can even find an accountability partner or form a mastermind group.

This is an important step because the people in your life will keep you on track. You want them to give you that ‘push’ as you’re pushing your boundaries. They will make it hard for you to quit because you know you’ll look foolish if you did.

Example: Using the previous example you’ll tell people that you want to become a master salesperson. Make a public declaration that you’re committing to making at least 20 calls a day. Hopefully if your friends and family care they’ll ask you each day if achieved your mini goal.

Step #4 – Take Baby Steps

A journey of a thousand miles begins with a single step.

~ Lao Tzu

Breaking out of your comfort zone starts with the first step. Once you have a plan in place you’ll simply start with that crucial initial action.

Taking ‘baby steps’ is a great way to de-sensitize yourself to the feelings of anxiety. You’re not trying to become an overnight success. Instead you’re steadily pushing the boundaries of your comfort levels and working towards an overall goal.

Example: Like I said before, you’re going to take baby-steps with your sales job. First you would practice on friends and family. Then you would call the “warm leads” who are ready to buy. Finally, you would work on those nasty dead leads who are really challenging.

Step #5 – Aggressively Challenge Your Comfort Zone

To really blast through your comfort zone, you would do what I call an “aggressive challenge.” This is a rapid-fire approach where do a lot of something that makes you scared. The idea here is you’re shocking the system into becoming comfortable.

You won’t have time to think about your fear. Instead you’ll be so busy pushing your boundaries that you forget about what used to make you scared.

Example: An ‘aggressive challenge’ for your sales job would be to call 100+ prospects in set amount of time. You don’t think during this process. You just do it. If a person is rude or hangs up, you quickly dial another number and move on.

Step #6 – Remain Positive

There will be times when you experience a negative outcome. Something that shakes your confidence and makes you feel scared. The trick is to not let anything prevent you from blasting past the point of comfort.

Recognize that you will have negative outcomes. It’s a natural part of the process.

Don’t allow negativity to creep into your mind. Remind yourself that it’s going to happen. In fact, you should recognize that you’re actually being given feedback about how you can do something better.

Example: With cold calling there is a large number of ‘rejections.’ People will hang up, they’re going to be rude, and some might even threaten to kill you.

Step #7 – Keep Expanding Your Comfort Zone

Never stop expanding your comfort zone. Even if you arrive at your stated goal it’s important to keep pushing those boundaries.

Look for new comfort zone challenges. Find stuff that you would never imagined you would do. Like teaching a class on the subject that once filled you fear. Or you could work on a related skill.

9. START A HOBBY

In the same vein, getting out of your comfort zone by starting a hobby can be a great step towards self-improvement.

Is there anything you’ve ever really wanted to try? Have a friend with a real passion that you’d love to get involved in? Whether it’s fitness or something you do online from your laptop, starting a hobby will make you a more well-rounded person.

1. Take It Back To Your Childhood. If you don't know where to begin, think back to what you loved doing as a kid. ...

• 2. Try A Couple Of Ideas On For Size. If you're stumped where to begin, throw yourself into options and see how you respond to them. ...
• 3. Choose Something That Will Make You Forget About Your Day. ...
• 4. See If You Have Any Past Hobbies That You Forgot About. Maybe you already had a hobby, just you completely forgot about it. ...
• 5. Notice What You Love To Buy As Guilty Pleasures. Is there a certain thing you just can't help but buy every time you're out shopping? ...

10. WAKE UP EARLY

It’s no myth that successful people wake up earlier. This tip comes up time and time again, for self-improvement, increase productivity, happiness, and general well-being. It’s no coincidence that two super successful entrepreneurs recommended the same thing: