Steps To Personal Development Personal development is really all about the setting of goals. This is something that personal coaches, mentors, management of organizations have harped on for years, but it is still true. How can anyone make any progress and get where they want to go, if they have no idea where they are going?
One of the problems that many people have is the sad fact that they really do not want to improve because they have become satisfied with their present position. With people like that there is no point in even talking to them about growth and development in their lives. It is impossible to motivate the un-motivatable.
There is an old saying that states, “All development is self development”. It does boil down to a personal decision that things need to change, and the individual that says that and means it is the only person who can make it happen.
Goal setting has to be personal and specific. There can never be a goal set where there is not a problem. So, the problem has to be identified at the outset, and then a strategy needs to be devised to fix the problem. That sounds too simple, but whittled down to the basics, that is really the entire process.
The goal should be specific. A goal such as “get better at golf” is a much too general. This objective needs to be broken down into parts. It is probably important to improve the actual golfing skills, such as short iron play. This is where many golfers have a lot of problems. Now the goal is more specific and can be stated as, “practice 100 approach shots to the green per day, until I can come within 50 feet of the pin 70% of the time”.
Now a specific action is place on the table and that action relates to a specific objective that is the result of that action. Is there any doubt that if a person would hit 100 shots a day that he or she would not improve that area of their golf game?
This same principle can be applied to anything in life. If we break down great big goals like “make more money”, into smaller, achievable goals, the bigger goals can be achieved by completing the smaller, more attainable goals one at a time. Once a smaller skill or attribute is mastered, it becomes a natural process to the larger objective.
As for the “make more money” goal, a smaller, more identifiable goal could be “make and successfully operate a personal budget for 3 months”. That is a logical step towards taking control of personal finances. Once the budget is under control, it is possible to determine how much, if any, extra funds would be available for additional investment or as venture capital for starting a small business.
Personal development occurs when a person sets objectives and then focuses like a laser on the various actions and principles necessary to cause the objective to occur.
