How to sustain your commitment to your own personal growth
I asked a few simple questions today on Instagram. The first was this…
Have you ever struggled to keep up with your commitment to yourself and your personal growth?
So far 100% of responders have said, yes! This doesn’t surprise me as I too have felt the struggle to keep personal awareness and growth on my radar when so many other things are vying for attention!
We may have finished up a period of one-to-one therapy or finished an online course feeling tanked up with motivation. Motivated to create space and time to journal, walk, use creativity to keep ‘tuning in’ or simply to keep the pace of life slow enough for self-reflection. We may have thought… ‘10 minutes a day would be great and I know I’m worth that and I know it would be so valuable for me and everyone else around me’.
Suddenly 6 months have passed and our journal gathers dust beside the bed, we don’t remember where we put our art materials and we’ve forgotten those brilliant tools we were using to help us to be fully grounded, to stay present, and to sleep well. We find we’re a little more stressed again, a little more cranky, and a lot more dis-regulated.
So my second question is…
What would help you keep a commitment to yourself?
Some brilliant answers so far…
Accountability to others
To see results (but I give up before I see results)
To be linked in with others also trying to reach certain goals
This answer really fits with my third question…
Would you find support in a group/community helpful?
So far everyone has said either ‘yes’ or ‘maybe’.
I would absolutely love to hear more responses to these questions. If you can relate to the challenge, what do you think would genuinely help you? Please email any ideas you have because my desire (and plan!) is to create something that would be a genuine support to help people stay on track with their commitment to their personal growth. I’m very excited about what might be included in that and will share some ideas that I have below. Would these help you?
creative projects
journal prompts
affirmations, quotes, poems
guided audible groundings
topics introduced to prompt inner-reflection
a forum to chat with others
an opportunity for pairing with others
live online group sessions
I hope to update you later in the year and have something specific, tangible and practical to offer from January 1st!
For now, one key motivator to help you stay invested in your personal growth is to consider the benefits for everyone around you. Far from being ‘selfish’ or ‘self-absorbed’ it is an investment in all of our relationships as well. I’m a regularly reminded of how this work has impacted people in a positive way by such comments as…
‘I am a better parent’
‘I feel more compassion for people’
‘I finally feel like I listen properly to my family’
‘I am beginning to take responsibility for who I am and how I am’
‘I feel more connected to my children’
‘My friends all say there’s something different about me’
‘I feel so much more patience with others’
‘I feel more real in my friendships’
It is a good reminder and hopefully a good motivator for any of us who struggle with this, to recall that any time spent in personal development is a win for us and for everyone around us. When we don’t feel motivated to do it for ourselves, we may be motivated to do it for others.
