What is Personal Growth? How Do You Grow?

What does personal growth mean and how do you do it? Personal growth means a lot of things to different people. To me, personal growth is improving myself. It is not becoming someone I am not. Personal growth is improving upon my gifts and talents, while learning how to soften my rough edges and minimize my weaknesses. One of the first steps to self improvement is to identify what areas you want to improve. Next, create a plan. Along with a plan, it’s a good idea to get a coach or mentor to help you along the way. There are a lot of different coaches for different things. As I mentioned in my article, Are You a Perfect Leader?, you can’t expect one person to be your coach in all areas of your life. You need to have different coaches to guide you in the areas where they excel. 

What Areas Should People Focus Personal Growth?

Some of the main areas where people chose to focus are health, relationships, financial, spiritual, and recreation. I am passionate about growing a relationship with God, health and wellness, leadership, and improving the relationships in my life. These are areas where I feel like I have grown over the years and am now at a point where I can help others to benefit from what I’ve learned. This is why I organized this blog into Love Yourself (Leadership and Relationship with God), Love Your Family (Relationships with Family and Spouse), and Love Your Health (Nutrition and Wellness). 

Love Yourself includes leadership and spiritual growth because I have been able to grow my self image by growing my relationship with God and by learning success principles that I wasn’t taught in school or my job. For me, it is hard to separate the two. Therefore, I feel like they go hand in hand. As I’ve grown in my relationship with Jesus, I’ve grown in my leadership skills. As I’ve learned more success principles, I’ve learned more about Jesus and who I am in Him. You are free to have your own spiritual beliefs. I have love for you regardless of where you are on your personal spiritual journey. Please understand I will be speaking from a Christian view, so take what applies to you and feel free to just scroll past what doesn’t connect with your belief system.

Please take some time to think on what areas are important to you. What areas would you like to improve? There’s no right or wrong answer. It is very personal to each person.

Setting Goals and a Plan for Personal Growth

After you have decided in which areas you want to grow, you need to set some goals and create a plan for how you want to grow. Here are some examples: 

• I typically like to read books from experts on the topics I’ve chosen.
  • I like to read because I can think about how it applies to me while I’m reading.
  • However, if you aren’t able to set time aside to read, I’ve heard audiobooks are super helpful for many people.
• I listen to Podcasts from people who have become role models in the areas I choose to grow.
• I set aside quiet time to grow in my relationship with God.
• Many people watch YouTube videos to learn to do a hobby.
• There are also classes you can take to improve in an activity or topic.
• Exercise or learning about nutrition are ways to improve health. 

There are many things you can put in your personal growth plan. Chose 5 things to do each day and make a routine out of it. John Maxwell calls it his “5 Swings.” Others call them five daily habits. It doesn’t matter what you call them. They are things you want to do every day to move you closer to the person you want to be. Many success coaches teach you to do these things first thing in the morning. This is because prioritizing them first thing is a way to make sure they are accomplished. I also prefer to do them first thing in the morning, even though I’m not a “morning person.”

Sometimes Things Try to Throw You Off Track

I love starting my day off with the feeling of accomplishment I get from a productive morning routine. However, I am in a season of life where my mornings are unpredictable. It seems no matter what time I plan to get up, a child wakes me before my alarm. Then, none of my morning goals got completed. After a couple weeks of this happening, I realized that if I didn’t do them in the morning, I forgot to make time later in the day. I then decided to adjust my morning goals to a different time of day. This way they still happened. It’s ok if you have to shift when life is a bit unpredictable. It happens to all of us. The most important thing is to make it a priority to get your goals accomplished each day.

One of the things I really liked about getting my goals accomplished in the morning was being able to start my day with my quiet time. I liked having that intentional time to pray and think on Jesus before getting bombarded with the daily responsibilities of life. I had heard that the Bible taught that it was a spiritual discipline that was to be done first thing every morning. When I wasn’t able to do it first thing in the morning, I felt a lot of guilt over switching it to the afternoon or evening. For me, I had to realize that having that time in the afternoon or evening was better than not having it at all.

I think Jesus is about relationship. He doesn’t care what time of day I prioritize Him, as long as we are spending intentional time together. It’s also important that I touch base with Him and communicate with Him throughout my day. My bible teacher once asked, “If you only speak to your husband for 20 minutes a day first thing in the morning, what kind of marriage would you have?” 

Honestly, I’m more of a night owl than a morning person, so I prefer to connect with my husband more in the evening than the morning. If I’m groggy and setting a timer to spend my time with Jesus in order to check it off my list before starting my day, I don’t have the right attitude behind my quiet time. I want to be alert and excited to spend time with him, like I look forward to connecting with my husband without distractions.

Sometimes You Forget About Your Goals

There are times in my life where I have gotten distracted from my personal growth goals and forgotten about them for some reason. If you find that has happened, please don’t feel guilty or ashamed. Just pick a place to start and start again. Spend some time reflecting on why they are important to you and what would motivate you to stay consistent. Were there any triggers that threw you off track from your goals. Could you change something to make them more top of mind? Maybe you can find an accountability partner or coach to help keep you on track this time.

There are many coaches and life coaches available to you. I hope to be able to help you reflect on areas of your life that you want to improve and offer insights in the areas I am passionate. If you’d like me to coach you in Health, Spiritual Growth, or Relationships, please reach out to me via the About page. I think finding the right coach, accountability partner, and/or mentor in such an important piece of personal growth. Please be sure to find someone to help you grow.

For we are glad when we are weak and you are strong. And this also we pray, that you may be made complete.

2 Cor 13:9 (NKJV)

If this article resonated with you, please share it with a friend. Did you learn anything from it? Did it inspire you in any way? What are some areas in which you would like to prioritize personal growth? What are some steps you are taking to get there?