Personal Growth Tips

Looking at our life at present, many of us notice that they lived and even live not so much in the present, but in the past and the future.

The question is if this way of living your life is efficient and benefic for us.

It’s a good thing to analyze our past behaviors and past events, because only in this way we can learn how not to repeat our past mistakes and how to apply again our successful past attitudes, believes, thoughts and behaviors.

Also is a good thing to plan our future, setting goals, because only so we can progress and achieve great things.

In this respect, our capacity to access the past and project the future is an asset of humans.

We are the only creatures on earth (as far as we know) that can remember the past as discrete events, then connect those events with present conditions. Then, on the basis of those connections, we can consciously decide what to do, and project possible present actions into the future consequences of those actions. Thus, unlike other animals that react to stimuli as they occur, humans live not only in the present, but in the past and the future. A dog may bristle at a threat, but not at a threat that’s long gone or hasn’t occurred yet. Humans will do all three. It is this ability to remember the past, relate it to the present, and project into the future that is a special province of humans. This ability allows us to manipulate our environment, communicate across distance and time, and evolve incredibly complex societies and cultures.

Social Basis of Human Behavior

Things begin to go wrong when we let our inner world to be overwhelmed by regrets over the past and fear of the future. In this way the past and the future are two thieves which steal our present.

We must agree that living in the present is hard. We can enjoy a moment, but it doesn’t last too much, we soon find ourselves dwelling on something we did or want to do.

Usually, a mind that isn’t disciplined wander non-stop filled with thoughts that run back and forth to the past and the future, this mental agitation is the most unproductive kind of mental activity.

It is hard to live in the very present moment, because it come and go very, very fast. If you say “now…”, then say again “now…” the first “now…” is already on the path to the past. So the present moment is only a tiny and fast point. It’s easier to live in the present if we think of it as being a thicker point: from one minute to one day. Yesterday belong to the past even if the proximate past.

Tip: Discipline your mind to stay in the present by focusing and refocusing your mind on your senses (be aware of what happens around you and enjoy details).

If you ever asked yourself why others behaved rude or unpleasant with you at a given moment, there is a simple answer: your own attitude determined their behavior. I see this every day, when I watch my son (one year and five months old) playing with other children. If one of them is shy, then my son will dominate and rule their interaction. If there is one of them bold (usually being older than my son), then my son will be more cautious and less rude with him.

There are studies which show that depressed, anxious children are more likely to be bullied. This prove the idea that your attitude, behavior determine others’ attitude and behavior towards you.

Each of us is a good psychologist when it comes to read others’ attitude and inner & outer power. Even a little boy can see if a peer is stronger than him or not. But not each of us is a good psychologist when it comes to implement and practice a certain attitude or behavior. You may notice and even be conscious what kind of attitude do you need in order to obtain something from others, but you may have problems to implement it in your daily life.

There is a simple and efficient solution. It is called “as if” attitude. This means that you can behave in a certain way, even if in reality (daily) you don’t behave so. If you think that a certain attitude or behavior may have good results for you, it is a good choice to try this in your daily life, in the form of “as if” attitude.

The philosophy of “as if” is especially pertinent for constructivist psychotherapy. Rather than seeing people’s personalities as hard-wired in some kind of essential way, personal construct therapists employing fixed-role therapy encourage an “as if” approach. For example, a client who identifies as “shy” might be asked to act out the role of a “gregarious” person for a few weeks; that is, the client lives “as if” he or she was more outgoing in order to see what ensues. By acting “as if” he or she is more outgoing, the client experiments with new ways of behaving and anticipating life, which often leads to positive therapeutic change. While the logic of ‘as if’ has been mostly applied in the realm of psychotherapy, it can easily be generalized to just about any area of human inquiry, making it a key concept in personal construct psychology specifically and constructivism more generally.

Philosophy of “as if”

“As if” attitude cause two results: one is that practicing an external attitude for an enough long time, it may become an inner and authentic attitude; other one is that you can consciously and voluntarily determine others’ behavior towards you.

We make a big noise (and this is great) about the pollution of our natural environment. The reason of ecological movement is that if we don’t care about our natural environment, then it will revenge (already it happens) and our lives will suffer.

What about the pollution of our psychological environment? Do we care about it? What do you think is there a need for an ecological mind? If we don’t care about our psychological environment, wouldn’t it revenge as well as natural environment already do?

I talk here about a few factors that pollute our psychological environment: worries, distress, fatigue and too high exigencies.

Worries

I have a note in my journal that say: “If you realize that you go through this life without enjoying it, you must take a time for self-analysis in order to eliminate the WORRIES”.

Worries may rise from a legitimate and useful psychological process, such as: future activities planning or future events forecast and prognosis. We have the capacity to foresee and estimate some future events, but we may transform these legitimate and useful thoughts into worries if we let them overuse repeatedly and automatically our mind. Worries happen when you emotionally think of your future.

Tip: Plan your future activities and revise them (if you have any updates or improvements), but don’t run these thoughts over and over again. Most important, don’t imagine what will happen if things go wrong. Visualize things happening in the best way possible.

Distress

There are two kinds of stress. One kind is constructive and benefic and one that is destructive and negative for human development.

The first one called eustress (positive, pleasant or curative stress) imply the idea that all living beings, especially we humans, need a minimum amount of challenge or resistance from their environment, to develop and grow. In order to enjoy success, achievement and don’t get bored, we human beings need challenging activities. Eustress is this optimal amount of stress from our environment, which keep us challenged, engaged and interested in that activity.

The second kind - distress - happens when the first kind go beyond its optimal limits. When the challenges and resistances from our environment are too many and too intense, they are overwhelming for us. We are built to handle a limited amount of this kind of activities, even if there are some that push their limits far beyond.

Fatigue

As a direct consequence of distress appears an overwhelming state of tiredness called fatigue. Fatigue is an extreme form of psychological pollution, which negatively affects your daily life. Especially, it affects your daily productivity and mood. Your productivity decrease visible and your mood tend to have a nuance of depression and irritability. Fatigue is a major factor that prevents your daily joyousness and happiness to manifest at their highest limits.

Standards and Possibilities

It’s a good practice to raise your standards when you think in terms of personal growth. If you want to grow and develop yourself, your standards and aspirations must be a little higher than your possibilities. This let you a “space for growing” that will motivate you to take action.

If your standards and aspirations are too higher than your possibilities, there is a big probability that they will prevent you taking action. In the case you take action your efforts may be overwhelming, due to the big discrepancy between your standards and your possibilities.

Tip: Raise your standards as much as to reach them with an optimal effort and only after you achieved them raise your standards again. This is the key of personal development and excellence achievement.

Even if there are debates if optimism is a shallow and naive outlook on life or not, there are many proofs that optimistic approach of life has many positive effects. It has many positive effects in contrast with the pessimistic approach, which has many negative effects. Also it has more positive results in comparison with another highly appreciated approach - the realistic outlook on life. And this fact makes optimistic thinking the best option we can make, in all areas of our life.

The question is: What makes you optimistic?! If we agree that this is the way to go, the next step is to understand what makes you think optimistically, what is strongly associated with being optimistic?

Health Level

There is a direct correlation between your level of health and your level of optimism. In general, physical and mental healthy people are more optimistic than those which have problems of health. But there are exceptions too; some physical and mental impaired people show a healthy dose of optimism and hope.

Due to the strong mind-body connection, here appears a circle of determination: the healthier you are, the more optimistic you’ll be, and the more optimistic you become, the healthier you’ll be.

Age Level

There is a general opinion that young people are more optimistic than old people, and studies prove this. This happens because young people think they have a whole life in the front of them and have a lot of positive expectations from this. Old people generally think that their life is close to the end, and so they have no more expectations and hope from this life.

Even so, in old people the optimism live when their mental age is younger than their physical age, and also when they hope in a positive after-life.

Physical Activity

It is well established that physical activity boosts your subjective well-being. The same thing happens with your level of optimism. Physically active people are more optimistic than physically passive people. This happens due to power of body over mind (the physical and chemical processes that physical activity produces in the brain).

Here we talk about two kinds of physical activity: the physical activity due to the nature of your work and physical activity through exercise. Both boost your optimism level.

Social Activity and Relationships

There must be equilibrium between two conflicting kinds of needs: the need for loneliness and the need for social interaction. We sometimes need to be alone and other times to talk and interact with others.

A rich social activity and quality social relationships correlate highly with a high level of optimism. Being among others and positively interacting with them make us feel better, have confidence and hope in ourselves and others.

Others may influence your life very much, so you have to pay attention when you chose your pals and friends. However, much more affect your life the way you manage your interaction with others, how you perceive others and how you relate with them.

Mental Activity and Education

Higher scores of optimism are associated with being better educated. Even if there are some that say that a high level of education makes you more realistic not more optimistic, there are reasons to think that a high educated person will integrate the realistic viewpoint in an optimistic approach of life. Mainly, because an educated person is pragmatic and so will make the difference between usefulness of optimism and accuracy of realism, integrating them in the long run of achievement and success.

Another aspect of mental activity is if its tone is predominant positive and so optimistic or negative and so pessimistic. Here, the main role plays your power and ability to monitor, change or replace our negative beliefs, values, attitudes and thoughts.

If you have noticed, the activity is a key factor in the causal process of optimistic thinking. What do you think about “being optimistic”? How do you maintain your level of optimism?