Self reflection helps to identify your emotions, actions and behaviors in any situation that you may face. which improve your self awareness and resilience. however Being busy in life and its ups and downs make us neglect our own self!
With life and work pressures, stress increase and
affect our daily routine until it becomes a routine by itself to experience
continuous stress. A bad meeting, a crucial conversation, bills need to be
paid, and so on. That initiates the inner Self-talk starts which leads
to stress.
Stress leads to emotional and physical disorders such as; depression, anxiety,
insomnia, headaches and more!
What is Self awareness?
Self awareness is simply giving time to get along with yourself. Seeing yourself in life as if you were another person observing you. It is about focusing on the reality of your behavior and not on the story you tell yourself about yourself.
What is self reflection?
One of the reflection definitions;
Serious thought or consideration.
Self-reflection-in simple words- looking at yourself from a mirror to assess your behavior, feelings, emotions, and reaction regarding an event.
Why self reflection is important for your self awareness?
Self-awareness is important to manage and
permanently change your life. Regular practice of self-reflection can help you take the right
actions to achieve your goals in the future.
The goal of self-awareness is to feel
relaxed, happy and lives your life in calmness. It is to learn and know about
yourself. Self-reflection
considered an essential learning tool about yourself.
How to practice self reflection?
As I said you can and should
apply self-reflection in every aspect of your life. However, I advise my
clients in life and executive coaching session to start with 10min a day then
gradually increase it when it becomes part of your inner system to reach the level
that you do reflect right after the event or situation you been though. I will
give you six simple questions you can start with;
What is the issue?
What did I felt, seen and heard?
How did I react?
What was the impact and
outcome of my reaction?
How could I have reacted differently?
What my reaction will be in a
similar future issue?
Final thoughts:
Being in control of your mind and body is an important factor to reach any goal you set for yourself, hence have is a strong self awareness is an essential skill you should build and empower. I help my clients during life coaching, executive coaching and career coaching in Dubai, KSA, Egypt to excel self reflection.
Start today to observe yourself and reflect, I recommend recording your self-reflection using writing, voice or video recording tool. That makes it simple to retrieve it in the future. You can use the Modelawer app to set a goal with your reflection outcomes in order to stay aware and reminded. Start with 10 min a day preferred to be evening time and in a relaxed quiet place to avoid any distraction and gradually start to repeat reflections through-out the day.
You are Scrolling down on Instagram and see a photo of
food and that trigger “WOW, I am hungry”. But what triggers the feeling of
being stressed in
you? What triggers the anxiety in you?
When suddenly you remember a
bad meeting you been into today, a crucial conversation you had with your boss,
pending report you did not finish today, financial issues you are facing and so
on.
When those thoughts pop-up in
mind, what happens next? Self-inner talk starts, and a long dialog starts to
take place between you and your self, a small control tower in your brain called hypothalamus decides to send out the order; the
stress hormones!
Stress leads to sleepless nights, exhaustion, excessive worry, lack of focus,
and irritability. Even physical symptoms – like rapid heart rate, muscle
tension, and headaches
If you let yourself with the flow
and did not stop to think about all this, you are putting yourself on autopilot
mode and allowing those thoughts, behavior and reactions to control you.
How to reduce stress and avoid anxiety?
Ask yourself what triggers the stress in you? What initiates those thoughts and inner talk? How do you feel in that state? How your body reacts? and that what is called Self-awareness.
What is self awareness?
Self-awareness is simply giving time to get along with yourself Understanding your personality, your values, your relationships, and your beliefs. Self-awareness includes understanding how you process your experiences. Ability to manage the self and its feelings, reactions, habits, and behaviors
Why self awareness is important?
Self awareness is one of the most life fundamentals and the most
ignored one as well.
It is the awareness of your body
responses, thinking patterns and thoughts, including feelings, desires and the
way you react. Plus, and most importantly how these relate to each other – awareness of how the
mind-body connection reacts with the external world.
As I mentioned if
your mind reacts to thoughts in pilot mode, then they control you! If you want
to control them, you should focus and identify the triggers as well as how your
mind processes them?
Start with the stress and anger moment. Think about;
what
made me stress?
What
I have thought about it?
What
and when this situation happened?
Who
is involved?
Is
it one-off or repeatedly happening?
How
I reacted at this moment? And keep digging deep!
Discovering the trigger and how your mind reacts until it
gives the order to be stressed
is the self-awareness.
Example, while you are at home watching a movie, then all
of the sudden you feel your body getting tense, heartbeat increases slowly,
there is a vague image hits your mind about that bad meeting you had with your
boss a few days back and in seconds you get stressed and all your mood changes! Let’s reverse
it;
what
made me stress? That image about the meeting
What I have thought about it? How
unfair my boss is, he never listens to me, I can’t express my thoughts with
him, I cannot even defend my point, and so on
What
and when this situation happened? A meeting with my boss four days back
Who
is involved? My boss
Is
it one-off or repeatedly happening? Yes
How
I reacted at this moment? I freeze, my body got so tensed
Can you see how things became more logical, now what
should you do?
Practice self reflection decides what is in your control and what is not
and get yourself together to let go.
How to practice self awareness?
Look at yourself independently
See
yourself as you really are! Though identifying and writing the following Self-perceptions;
Things you are good at
Things need to be improved.
Things
you are proud of.
Your
childhood and what made you happy back then.
Seek
honest feedback from someone you truly trust, about what he/she sees and feels
you?
In the end, you will come
out with a fresh new perspective on yourself and your life.
Keep a journal.
It sounds an old
fashion, but it is proven to be a mind relive and I recommended to my clients
in life coaching sessions, writing almost everything you want in a journal
relive the mind of those ideas and free up space for new information.
I advise my
coaching client to a specific time on the day to write down their thoughts,
feelings, ups, and downs for the day. This will lead to self-reflection
Tip: you can use
a journal apps which most of them has a password to keep your data protected
Define and set your goals
Dreams without goals are just dreams! That stays in our mind and keep it busy without directions or vision. Turn your dreams or even small things you want to accomplish in the short and long term into a defined SMART goal and break them into sub-goals that make you taste and celebrate small wins. Setting and achieving goals is a lengthy process, so you Download Modealwer app that helps you in creating your life goals, career goals, leadership goals, productivity goals, financial goals, and stay on track. Also,
Self reflection
In order to have self-awareness, performing self reflection is a must. Again I advise my clients during the life or executive coaching sessions to preform self-reflection at least once a day and gradually increase to be done right after an even take place that they feel they need to reflect. For example, an argument took place with their spouse or tough meeting at work. Self-reflection applies to you as a person in any situation you face in life and or as a leader in your organization.
Final thoughts
Magic won’t happen overnight; self-awareness is a process just any other process that needs time and commitment. During this process if you got hit by those inner thoughts which you aware it will lead you to stress, change your body state stand up, take a walk, shake your body, etc. start a positive inner talk, tell yourself it does not matter, it does not worth, go more into positive talks where the sky is the limit! That may work especially if you started before a significant emotion take control.
