Wondering which areas of personal growth you can focus on? In this article, guest writer Amy Jones shares the top 5 areas for personal development.
Estimated reading time: 5 minutes
Personal growth is all about looking for ways to improve yourself in a whole range of different areas of life. Wanting to grow as a person can be quite daunting as it can be difficult to know where to begin, so we’re here to briefly introduce the 5 different areas of personal growth, as well as small ways that you can focus on each of them, to make it less daunting and more of a positive process!
Here’s What You’ll Discover:
Mental Growth
Mental growth is all about focusing on developing your mind, pushing the way that you think and learn. Improving the way that you work mentally can not only benefit you, but also can make you more efficient in the workplace and in life in general. Mental growth also helps you to reduce limiting thoughts, so you can fulfil your potential. The types of activities you do for mental growth can easily fit into your existing routine, from a 20 minute podcast to reading 15 pages of your book. Here are some examples of mental growth:
- Learning a new skill, from an instrument to a language
- Reading a new genre of book
- Watching a documentary about a historical era
- Learning a new skill from YouTube
Social Growth
Social growth and development is all about pushing yourself to improve communication, knowing how to talk to people and going out of your way to spend time with new and different people who may push you out of your comfort zone. Becoming a better and more confident communicator also helps in working environments, especially if you’re in a management position or are required to work effectively within a team as part of your role. There are plenty of ways to do this:
- Join a new club or volunteer for something you’re interested in
- Put yourself out there by reaching out to new people
- Speak to people online with similar interests
- When travelling, meet new people and learn about different cultures
Physical Growth
Next we have physical growth and development, which is about more than just exercise. Whilst looking after yourself and taking care of your body physically is a part of it, it’s also about improving your energy levels, focusing on your wellbeing, relieving stress on the body and becoming more balanced. It’s also about making your physical health a priority, from booking to see your dentist in Wakefield through to having your smear tests and eating the right foods. A combination of a healthy diet, exercise and mindful movement (e.g. focusing on flexibility and bone health) helps you to achieve this.
- Taking your dog for a walk
- Getting plenty of sleep
- Practising yoga
- Regular exercise classes
- Going for hikes outdoors
- Lifting weights
- Playing a sport
Emotional Growth
Emotional growth is about building your emotional intelligence, so you’re better at understanding feelings. This can help you to become a healthier person in relationships, whether romantic or with friends and family. Being able to learn about feelings, emotions and the types of empathy, why someone may be reacting and understanding that someone may not react the same way to the same situation as you, you can manage both your own feelings better as well as reduce conflict.
- Journal to identify how you deal with different situations so you’re self aware
- Practise active listening
- Focus on communicating your feelings clearly to loved ones
- Practice activities to remain calm in stressful situations
- Read books on being open minded and genuinely processing other people’s feelings
Spiritual Growth
Lastly we have spiritual growth, which is about connecting with yourself, understanding who you are and finding inner peace. This looks different to everyone, however here are some examples of how you can work towards spiritual development.
- Practising meditation or yoga
- Spending time away from devices to think about what you want from life and what matters
- Develop awareness through journaling
- Spend time in nature
Final Thoughts
So, we hope our introduction has given you some inspiration on how you can start to work towards your personal growth. To begin with, why not set aside a small amount of time each day to focus on one area of your personal growth, and you’ll soon see the benefits. Many of the areas of personal growth tie in to one another, for example if you start playing a sport again, you’ll be focusing on your physical growth, as well as social growth and potentially also mental growth if you’re thinking of new strategies.
Take your time with this, as it’s not a journey that will or should happen overnight. Personal growth is a lifelong activity and you shouldn’t put pressure on yourself to have everything figured out within days, weeks, months or even years of starting your journey. Life changes and throws unexpected things at us, so personal growth is all about striving to be a good person throughout those changes and dedicating the time to ourselves to make that happen.
