5 Ways to Become More Self Aware

Personal growth can be hard. And to make it even more difficult to grow as a healthy, stable, responsible individual, you need to be self aware.

"Self awareness is the ability to focus on yourself and how your actions, thoughts, or emotions do or do not align with your internal standards."

So how do we tune into ourselves and become more self aware? How do we alter how we speak, think and act so we match our outward selves to match our inward beliefs and values? With work, patience and using these five ways to become more self aware.

1. Self Reflect

You can’t make adjustments if you do not have an accurate understanding of yourself. The good, the bad, the ugly. By acknowledging and accepting yourself as you are, you’ll know how and where you would like to make changes.

1. Ask Yourself Questions

Whether you want to do this internally or through daily journaling, asking yourself questions will 1. Help us clarify what we want and don’t want. 2. Help us question our own decisions. 3. Help us evaluate ourselves in a less judgemental form.

Not sure what questions to ask yourself? Use these 225 questions to ask your future self as a guide.

"Self-awareness is the ability to take an honest look at your life without any attachment to it being right or wrong, good or bad." –Debbie Ford

1. Know Your Strengths and Weaknesses

By recognizing your weaknesses you’ll be able to work and improve on them by implementing new habits to correct those weaknesses and monitor your self talk that might be fueling those weaknesses aka stop lying to yourself. When you know your strengths you can sustain those strengths and use them to help make better decisions and increase your self esteem.

1. Ask for Feedback

When you ask yourself questions you might have some incorrect views about yourself that have long been planted there, but when you ask others for feedback you might be surprised by what you hear. Involving others in your self aware progress will require vulnerability from you but by doing so you'll be able to identify and correct any views you feel need to be changed.

"Being self aware is not the absence of mistakes, but the ability to learn and correct them." –Daniel Chidiac

1. Identify Your Emotional Triggers

If you don’t have a grasp on your emotions then you’ll have a hard time adjusting your internal and external responses to align with the person you want to be. When you know what triggers you, you can begin to modify how you act on those emotions. But remember, you first have to be able to acknowledge and accept your emotions as well. Helpful ways to do so:

• Journaling

• Meditating

• Time to Yourself

Becoming more self aware might not be easy, but you’ll be a more adjusted happier person when you continue to learn about yourself. Use these five helpful ways to become more self aware and by doing so, adjust your words, thoughts and actions to become the person you want to be.

"Self-awareness is all about questioning one’s own truths, analyzing them and choosing only those truths that are beneficial to our inner self." –Dr. Prem Jagyasi

Jenn writes at her blog healthyhappyimpactful.com. She’s a mom of three looking to learn and grow. Check it out if you love helpful tips on health, family, and personal growth.