Invest in Your Personal Development

When you invest in your personal development, you take responsibility for your life, circumstances, and happiness. You become the agent, the doer, and the effecter.

If, on the other hand, you sit back and don't make the effort to take charge of your life, you set yourself up for events to affect you. If you're unprepared and not proactive, you will react to, rather than affect, what is happening around you.

It would be like being on a boat that springs a leak. If you have not prepared for the possibility, you'll be scrambling around, bailing out water, panicking, and hoping you don't sink. If you had anticipated this could happen, you had the proper tools handy; you fixed the leak, secured your vessel, and proceeded with your journey.

Two very different responses to the same obstacle.

So it is with life. Nothing is guaranteed or always goes as smoothly as planned - not your job, relationships, health, or anything else. Given that uncertainty, to make your life work, you must plan, set goals, prepare, and bring your best game (the best you).

Where do you start?

Once again, you start with yourself. You invest in your personal development and work on being the best you can be.

When you do, everything else comes together in seemingly effortless fashion - your relationships, work, home life, and overall sense of well-being. This doesn't mean that there aren't challenges and obstacles. There always are. It just means that you are better equipped to handle them.

How do you go about it?

Devise a personal development action plan or checklist to follow. It can be flexible and serve as a guide or outline for what you want to accomplish. Write it in a journal or chart format to monitor your progress.

For example:

Under Health

✓ Will incorporate a new exercise into a routine. (If you don't have a routine, this is an excellent time to start one.)

✓ Will reduce fat/food intake and try eating a new fruit or vegetable each.

✓ Will drink an extra glass of water each day.

✓ Will go to bed a half-hour earlier.

✓ Will cut down on junk food.

Under Intellectual Development

✓ Will read a new book each week (biweekly or monthly).

✓ Will go to the art gallery, theatre or symphony/concert once a month.

✓ Will listen to a new musical genre or artist.

✓ Will read about a different philosopher or literary figure once a month.

Under Emotional and Spiritual

✓ Will learn to meditate or learn a relaxation or deep breathing technique.

✓ Will take time for myself to rejuvenate, contemplate and connect.

✓ Will make a point of spending some quality time with family and friends.

✓ Will visualize and use affirmations to get into the positive thinking habit.

You can devise any plan or schedule that suits your tastes and needs. The important part is to decide to actively and consciously engage in personal development. Always be willing to stretch yourself, keep an open mind, and learn new things.

Benefits of Investing in Your Personal Development

• Will be proactive and affect change rather than merely react to or be at the mercy of it.

• Enjoy a sense of mastery and accomplishment.

• Be better able to maintain control of your reactions and emotions.

• Better clarify and define your goals.

• Live life more consciously, purposefully, and deliberately.

• Be more focused and centered.

• Acquire more self-awareness, self-trust, and self-confidence.

• Be more genuine and true to yourself.

Take the time to invest in yourself by developing all aspects of your being - physically, mentally, emotionally, and spiritually. To be your best is to live life to the fullest!