When you first start your personal development journey, it can be tempting to take short
cuts. You think that you already know who you are, what you want, and what you stand
for, and how to exemplify that. However, that’s not how the human mind works. Often,
we hide truths from ourselves and are not honest with ourselves about these issues. For
this reason, follow these best practices for starting your personal development journey
so that you will succeed.
Don’t Skip the SWOT – It’s imperative that you perform analysis on yourself in every
aspect of your life to find out what strengths, weaknesses, opportunities, and threats
you face for any of the target issues you want to address. For example, if you perform a
SWOT and realize that you’re not very good at something, you then have a choice. You
can find someone who is to do it for you, or you can find training to learn to do it.
Nurture Your Strengths – When you perform the SWOT for any sector of your life,
you’ll also identify your strengths. The best thing to do in life is to choose to lead with
your strengths. You want to keep doing the things you’re strong at and learn to do them
even better since you’re obviously interested in those things.
Improve Your Weaknesses – When you find out that you are weak in some area, you’ll
need to determine whether you should improve it yourself or improve it by outsourcing
it. To determine which is better, ask yourself whether it really matters who does it or just
that it is done.
Understand The 3 Domains of Personal Development – They are, physical,
cognitive, and social-emotional. Together, these domains cover all aspects of your life,
including health, work, personal growth, spiritual life, and so forth. Working on all
aspects of your life usually is much better than focusing only on one as they are
sometimes indistinguishable.
Plan for Action – As you work through crafting your plan, nothing is done until you’ve
set up action-packed steps and put them in your calendar scheduled for you to
implement them. Whether you are doing it yourself, or outsourcing it, doing is the most
critical part of the plan.
Focus on The Right Target Issue First – One reason it’s helpful to go through every
single domain and issue you have before setting up a plan is that it helps you to know
which issue to focus on first. For example, you cannot write a novel until you can read,
and you can’t learn to write until you can read, first things first.
Be Persistent – Once you have your action plan, which is developed based on reality
and not on how you wish it to be, you only now need to be persistent and take the steps

to success. It truly is that easy. Once you have the steps scheduled in your calendar
and you start implementing them, your life will begin to change.
Get a Coach – If you understand everything but your implementation skills leave
something more to be desired, you may want to employ a life coach to help you. If you
know some life coaches who specialize in personal development, you might want to talk
to them. If you don’t know anyone, ask your colleagues for recommendations. It’s likely
they will know someone or can direct you to someone who would know more on the
topic.
One thing to remember about personal development is that it’s an ongoing process.
You’re never done with it. There is no real finish line. For this reason, it’s best to
develop tenacity and persistence as you follow the path you’ve created for yourself,
adjusting as you go based on facts, and learning about what is really and truly important
to you deep in your subconscious. It’s all about knowing who you are and living a life
that illustrates who you are.