What is Self-Development? What stages of self-development exist? How to start the process of self-development

Boris Akunin

Do you know, dear friends, that one of the most sublime human needs is self-development? I’m sure you know, or at least feel it, and that’s why you showed interest in this topic. Yes, this is indeed a very strong need, inherent in all people without exception from birth. It is thanks to self-development that many people find meaning in life and achieve simply outstanding results in a variety of areas. And this is not surprising, because self-development is a person’s work on himself, with the goal of making himself better, if not in all, then at least in many respects. And the better you become, the more you can do in this life to achieve success in what is important to you. And in general, self-development is very interesting. Friends, I want to confess to you that I have deep respect for people who show interest in such things as self-development, self-improvement, self-knowledge, self-education, self-training, self-discipline and other similar topics. I am pleased to work with such people and for such people. Because I also want to become better than I am now. I always wanted this and always worked in this direction. Let's do this together now. And for this, let’s look at how you can and how you should engage in self-development in order to receive not only benefit from this process, but also great pleasure.

First of all, I want to say that the very fact that you are reading this article is already a great achievement for you. The point, of course, is not the article itself, although I will try to make it very high quality and useful for you, the point is your interest in this topic. After all, self-development begins from the moment a person pays attention to himself in order to identify himself in this world, to realize his strengths and weaknesses, in order to decide what he wants to become. This is a process of self-knowledge, the purpose of which is a person’s search for himself in this world. And you have already done this, you, firstly, found yourself, and secondly, you decided that the one you understand as your own “I” needs to change, and not just change, but improve. This is a good start, this is the right beginning - this is the beginning of self-development. Any person, if he pays attention to himself, sooner or later can discover in himself some, not so much shortcomings, we all have plenty of them, but, let’s say, not very well developed qualities that he considers bad developed because they compare themselves with other people. After all, everything is known by comparison, or almost everything. We cannot know how developed we are without comparing ourselves with other people.

But you don’t have to tell yourself that you are somehow worse than other people in order to want to develop yourself, if this does not so much motivate you to work on yourself as it suppresses you and forces you to give up. All you have to do is want to become a better person, being inspired by the merits of other people, without thinking about your own shortcomings. Let them, other people, especially successful people whom you sincerely admire, serve as good examples for you of what a person can become in general. This will give you faith that you can become like that, and even better, because you are human too. And at a certain stage of his development, a person begins to compare himself not with other people, but with himself in the past, using this as motivation for self-development. So it all starts with you paying attention to yourself and thinking about what kind of person you are and what kind of person you want to become. You did it by starting to read this article. But we need to move on, we need to understand the meaning of self-development, so as not to engage in this business, so to speak, blindly.

The meaning of self-development

Let's ask ourselves a question - what is the point of engaging in self-development if ultimately we will all come to the same end, regardless of the level of our development and the results achieved in life? I know this is a question many people ask when talking about their lives. In fact, there may not be any such pronounced meaning in self-development, as, indeed, in everything else that we do in our lives, if we proceed from the above position. We all really have the same ending. But if you think about it, then most likely the whole point is that we simply do not know about this meaning. How can we, for example, know why our Universe exists at all, why we appeared in it, and how our existence will ultimately end? All these are questions that any person can run into when discussing the meaning of anything. Therefore, I cannot tell you with complete confidence why you need to engage in self-development, and what is the point of it, if we proceed from the idea that sooner or later everything in this world will cease to exist, at least in the form in which it exists now.

But I believe that self-development itself can become for you the meaning of your life, precisely in this life. Why not? Why not use this life to get the most out of it that you can? After all, there may also be no point in not doing this. Right? What's the point in not engaging in self-development? What is the point in being lazy, going with the flow, being mediocre, afraid of everything, dreaming of nothing, doing nothing, striving for nothing? You don’t know this meaning either, right? But nevertheless, some people choose one path in their lives, while others choose another. And everyone lives their life as they see fit to live it. So maybe you can just make this choice - either in favor of self-development, or in favor of not doing it?

Desire to develop

Let's now think about another, also very interesting question - why do we want to do something, for example, engage in self-development, but don’t want to do something? Where do our desires come from anyway? Self-development is independent development, where independence is of key importance. But this desire to develop ourselves comes to us gradually. At first, any person learns and develops under the influence of external coercion, that is, with the help of other people who help him, so to speak, take the right path in life. If, of course, they help him with this. It is other people who serve as an example for us of how a person can live in general, showing us either a good or a bad example. A lot in our lives depends on this, you see, including the desire to develop.

If a person shows interest in the process of constant development, often thanks to other people, less often in spite of them, and becomes addicted to it, then he himself will be able to continue to teach and develop himself in the way he needs, and constantly, throughout his life. Therefore, it is so important, very important, to surround yourself with people as much as possible who can become good role models for you. It is their influence on you that will largely determine your attitude towards such things as self-development. Of course, we all have our own head on our shoulders, but what thoughts will prevail in it very much depends on our environment.

Let's take, for example, a type of activity such as reading, which very well contributes to the development of a person - it helps him gain new knowledge, develops his thinking, makes him more intelligent. You need to get addicted to reading, you just need to love this business, and then you will never stop doing it, you will never stop reading. You will always and everywhere try to read something to occupy your time, to learn something new. You will develop yourself through reading. The same is true with self-development in general. You only need to fall in love with this business, with this process, once, and then you will never stop loving it. Because developing yourself is pleasant and interesting. This process is much more enjoyable than, say, smoking, drinking alcohol, gambling and other, let's be honest, nonsense that some people engage in. So you just need to accustom yourself to self-development, just once make the necessary efforts to become addicted to this activity, if other people have not helped you with this, and then in the future the desire to develop yourself will only grow stronger in you. Even if the usefulness and interest of this activity is not yet obvious to you, and you do not yet feel pleasure from it, it is already taking over your consciousness, making you understand that you need to do this, you need to develop yourself. Because other people do it and they like it. So you might like it too.

At the initial stage, it is quite acceptable, and even necessary, for the reason stated above, to have someone help you fall in love with self-development. Some person whom you trust, whom you like, whom you will listen to if he begins to advise you something, should become your guide to the truly amazing world of people who with great pleasure engage in self-development and self-improvement and receive from this activities are a fabulous pleasure. After all, what is self-development, from the point of view of human activity - this is the acquisition of new knowledge, skills and abilities, this is the physical development of the body, this is the development of thinking, this is the ability to manage one’s inner world and everything else that is associated with the improvement of a person, or everything that is in a person, it will be more correct. It is quite obvious that for such work on oneself, a person may need a mentor, a teacher, an adviser who will help him take the first steps in this difficult task. After all, to engage in self-development means to use all the means at your disposal to improve yourself, including other people.

Motivation for self-development

Let's now look at what motivation for self-development can be in our lives, based on the influence that external factors have on us. I think the most important thing in self-development, from the point of view of motivation, is emotions. It is they, as a rule, who encourage us to this very self-development. Emotions release our energy, forcing us, at a minimum, to want something very much, or not want it, depending on what kind of emotion it is, and, at a maximum, to do something. And anything can cause them, even, as mentioned above, other people, even circumstances, even our own thoughts. And at the same time, it doesn’t really matter what emotions force us to take care of ourselves, the main thing is that, while under their influence, we actually do something. Pay your attention to what turns you on, what forces you to move, to learn something, to strive for something. All this can be a good motivation for self-development for you. So educate yourself. Something must worry you, something very good or very bad. Or both. You can either want to get something, achieve something, achieve something, or get rid of something - from work, from people you don’t like, from a hard life, from your own shortcomings that poison your life, and so on. etc. Sometimes, when a person has no desires at all, when he can’t even set any goal for himself, because he doesn’t know what he wants, it won’t hurt him to make his life a little worse in order, firstly, to stir himself up, and secondly secondly, to realize the values ​​that he already has and does not want to lose, and to preserve which he needs to meet certain requirements. In other words, look for opportunities to evoke strong emotions in yourself so that they motivate you to self-development. In general, life often throws us such problems that, as they say, you can’t relax, so it seems to me that many people have the motivation to become stronger, in the broad sense of the word.

We are constantly controlled by either negative emotions or positive ones, the only question is how we react to them. Some people are overwhelmed by negative emotions, so they do nothing, no matter how bad and uncomfortable they feel. And for others, even very strong positive emotions cannot force them to do something, because either it is difficult for them to cope with their laziness, or they simply do not believe in their own strengths, in the fact that they can achieve something. And there are also people who are simply indifferent to everything, who don’t care how they live. All these character traits have their own reasons - depression, laziness, and indifference to everything. This means that any of these problems can be dealt with. This is the task of a psychologist - to help you understand yourself. The main thing is that you are “alive”, that is, show great interest in life and be active. If you feel very bad, you should want to feel better. And don’t justify your suffering by saying that other people may have it even worse than you. And if you feel good, you should want to feel even better, you should strive for what will give you great pleasure. You need to train yourself to strive for victories in order to develop yourself with passion, with sparkle in your eyes, with interest. It attracts people - the high from success, from achievements, from victories - it is a very strong drug. And most importantly, it is a useful drug that does not kill, but improves a person.

At the same time, I want to emphasize once again that it is important to be able to use any emotions to motivate self-development. Some people move better when they are in pain, others when they really want something, that is, for some the stick is a good motivator, and for others it is a carrot. I recommend that you do not spend too much time studying all your psychological characteristics - fill your tank with exactly the fuel that allows you to work well and fly upward with all your might. That is, motivate yourself with what is closest to you. If bad emotions force you to do something with yourself and for yourself - let them be bad emotions, it’s okay - motivate yourself with fear, resentment, anger, aggression, whatever is more convenient for you. If it's greed, vanity, curiosity, then use it for motivation. Or maybe you just want to leave something behind in this world, something that will allow you to get great satisfaction from your life, as from a life in which there is meaning. The main thing is that you see why or for what you will develop yourself, you will make yourself better, you will learn new things, acquire new skills and abilities, get rid of your shortcomings and weaknesses. The main thing is that you care how your life turns out.

The benefits of self-development

In order to engage in self-development correctly and maintain sufficient interest in this process, you need to notice the benefits that you receive from it. Therefore, in self-development, recording the results achieved is very important when you notice real qualitative changes in yourself and certain successes in your life. Since we are designed in such a way that it is difficult for us to do something without seeing positive results from our activities for a long time, it is extremely important to notice even the slightest changes for the better in ourselves and enjoy them. Then you will not stop and will not stop engaging in self-development. Interest must be constantly fueled, a person must see the meaning and benefit in what he does. How to record results? This is not an easy matter, I’ll tell you right away. It all depends on what goals you pursue when developing yourself. Sometimes a person wants, well, let’s say, to get rich in a year, but after a year of actively working on himself, he may not have visible success in this area. No matter how many books he reads, no matter what he learns in a year, no matter what skills he develops, his financial situation may remain the same, or it may improve, but not significantly. Why? Yes for many reasons. Because it may take more time to achieve this goal, because the rest of the world also does not stand still and no amount of planning can be guaranteed to lead a person to the desired result, because, in the end, he may do something wrong, he may make mistakes and therefore not have the result he wants. And in general, not everything and not always in this life can be done the first time. Therefore, success does not come to people immediately and not to everyone, but mainly only to those who are persistent enough to be worthy of it. So if something doesn’t work out for you, then this is not a reason to give up everything and stop striving for your goal, stop developing yourself. It’s just that the results that you can achieve in a certain time may turn out to be more modest than you expected, but they will definitely be there.

I advise you to keep a diary and regularly write down in it all the changes that you observe in yourself and your life - this will help you see many positive changes in your life that will occur thanks to self-development. If you are learning something, studying something, training something in yourself, then any changes in this direction must be written down or otherwise recorded. Suppose you want to lose weight and go on a diet for this - start writing down in your diary how many kilograms you have lost in a week, a month, two months, six months, a year. Also, try to describe your emotional state in as much detail as possible in order to notice progress in this direction. Let all your work on yourself be before your eyes. In other words, write down, photograph, videotape all the changes that occur in your life thanks to your work on yourself. Usually we do not change very quickly, so we do not always notice these changes and it seems to us that we do not receive any benefit from self-development. For example, if you start actively reading smart books and articles, you will not immediately notice changes in yourself. It will seem to you that you are still the same person you were before, when in fact you will become smarter, more knowledgeable in some important issues, more flexible in your behavior, more effective in solving various problems and tasks, you will become make fewer mistakes and you will make the right decisions more often, and so on. All this is very difficult to notice, but it is possible and most importantly it is necessary, very necessary. After all, the trouble with many people is that they want everything at once, without even realizing that if they get everything they want, they will quickly lose all interest in life. This is why it is so difficult for some people to notice their progress. They notice only very strong changes, and these happen very rarely. So keep a diary and write down everything that happens to you in order to see the results that you have achieved through self-development.

But here’s the question: does it follow from the above that self-development must always have a clear and clear goal? No, friends, you shouldn't. There may not be a clear goal, for the simple reason that a person may not know about all goals, developing certain qualities in himself, receiving certain knowledge. But at the same time, he can be close to them, engaged in self-development. There are many examples in history of how some activity that initially seemed meaningless made the person doing it, if not great, then at least somewhat successful. It may be the same in your life. You can study something without fully understanding why you are doing it. And then your knowledge can be very useful to you. Well, let’s say you’re learning a foreign language, without the explicit goal of going somewhere where you can communicate with other people in it. But one day you may see an advertisement in the newspaper that says that a very large company for a highly paid job requires a specialist who, in addition to a good knowledge of his profession, also speaks the language that you studied. And at this moment your knowledge can be very useful to you. That is, I want to say that it does not always make sense to gain some knowledge to achieve a certain goal; you can do the opposite - adjust your knowledge to some interesting goal that you recently learned about. Therefore, the main thing, I believe, is that you have an interest in self-development, that you devote enough time to it, and that you can always find an opportunity to benefit from what you have gladly studied, mastered, developed in yourself.

Of course, you need to plan and set goals; life should not be chaotic, otherwise you may get confused in it. But understand one very important thing - when planning and setting goals, you are following a path already trodden by someone, because you are striving for what you already know and using methods that have already been developed by someone. This is good, but it may not be enough for a person who is not interested in everything known. Some people need a different meaning, a different motivation, in order to develop themselves, and in order to gain this meaning, they need to engage in self-development for the sake of self-development itself, without any plan or specific goals. You can combine self-development for the sake of a set goal with self-development for the sake of interest, when a person learns about everything he wants to know about and what he needs to know about, thereby maintaining an interest in working on himself. In other words, figuratively speaking, you need to maintain the fire of passion for self-development by any means. Because even though I wrote at the very beginning of the article that once you fall in love with this business, you will never stop doing it, but you can still lose your taste for an active life if you initially worked diligently on yourself not of your own free will, but out of necessity, or in other words, because of the impact other people have on you.

Self-development results

What could be your results in self-development? In fact, very different, from outstanding to barely noticeable. But at the same time, believe me, they are always there. And these results will definitely make your life better. I know a lot of people who are engaged in self-development and adhere to different strategies in this difficult, but extremely useful task. They pursue different goals with varying degrees of success. And I can say for sure - they all receive a certain reward for their efforts. Someone simply begins to think better, more efficiently, more practically, someone learns a new skill and, having acquired it, changes their job to a more interesting and profitable one, someone becomes a very good specialist in their field and people begin to value him highly, and someone... then you become healthier and more cheerful by working on your body. We always have room to grow. There is something to strive for. There is something to be successful at.

I believe that one of the important goals of self-development should be a person’s desire to make his internal picture of the world as consistent with reality as possible. After all, the better we understand the world around us - its structure, functions, laws, the greater opportunities we will have to make it more perfect. For example, an engineer, understanding the laws of nature, can use them to create various devices that will make people's lives better, easier, more interesting, more fun, and more comfortable. And a specialist who is well versed in the psychology of people can help them become happier and more cheerful, he can teach them to love themselves and life so that they receive satisfaction from it. And other specialists create medicines that save many people's lives. And so on. In other words, by learning about this world, thanks to development and self-development, we get the opportunity to change it. And even if we don’t always change it for the better, there is still no doubt that this needs to be done. So the more developed a person is, the greater the master of his life and even of this entire world he feels.

So, friends, self-development is really great. By doing it, you will not live your life in vain. Therefore, do not waste time - develop, learn, acquire new skills, set ambitious goals and look for ways to achieve them, the whole world is at your feet - live in it as a person, that is, be active. I don’t encourage you to do anything specific, for example, study psychology or anything else, I can only offer it to you. And you decide for yourself what you want to succeed in, what you want to learn to do, what you want to know, understand, realize. Self-development is self-development because a person decides for himself how and in what direction to develop. The main thing is to improve yourself, guided by the principles I described, and everything in your life will be wonderful. I invite you, friends, to develop together - I will write interesting articles for you on topics that are useful, from my point of view, and you will read them. And in this way we will explore this world, mainly, of course, from the perspective of psychology, after all, I understand more about it, but we will definitely touch on other topics. What do you say, do you agree?

• Self-development: self + development. That is, independent development of oneself.
• Self-improvement: self + improvement. That is, self-improvement.
• Development: formation or acquisition of new properties, skills and capabilities.
• Improvement: improvement, harmonization, bringing to the ideal of what is.

According to dictionaries, development and improvement are synonyms. Therefore, the words self-development and self-improvement should have the same meaning, and, in the overwhelming majority of cases, they are used exactly that way.

But there is still a difference between improving what you have and acquiring new properties. Therefore, we will try not to confuse these very similar concepts.

On the Internet there is an attempt to explain the difference from a moral and ethical position. Supposedly, you can develop any abilities you like, but only improve the good, creative ones.

I think it was drawn purely on an emotional wave. This is an attempt to give the word "perfection" an exclusively positive meaning, as if, for example, a killing machine could not be perfect. What can prevent you from improving any abilities if you already have them?

Self-development, what it is, what you need to know and what to develop

What is self-development

Self-development is a human activity aimed at satisfying his need to acquire new qualities.

The need for self-development refers to ideal (spiritual) needs. Both in P. V. Simonov’s pyramid of needs and in the most popular pyramid of needs according to Maslow, self-development is at the very top step, as the highest.

This need represents the idea that it is necessary to develop oneself, and is the main driving force on the path of knowledge, thus ensuring the evolutionary growth of man.

I believe that in order to sufficiently understand what self-development is, in order to determine its adequate place in one’s own life, it is enough to accept as a basis only the fact that this is a human activity aimed at satisfying his need to obtain new qualities.

What kind of self-development happens?

Self-development happens:

• Physical.
• Emotional.
• Intellectual.
• Spiritual.

These types of self-development resonate well with the types of paths of spiritual development that exist in the form of spiritual schools, well described in the book of Peter Uspensky “The Fourth Way”:

• The path of the fakir is to work with the physical body.
• The path of a monk is working with the psycho-emotional sphere.
• The path of a yogi is to work with the intellect.

Here I call the fourth path spiritual, since it unites and harmonizes all human capabilities at the same time, allowing one to be guided by unique and non-standard decisions.

Self-development: methods and directions

The need for self-development is an ideal (spiritual) phenomenon, but manifestations of this idea can be at any levels, depending on the chosen direction.

Any school of the spiritual path can be considered the most extreme form of self-development. Only the spiritual path of the “cunning man,” the so-called “fourth path,” allows a person to live in an ordinary environment. The rest require self-denial and strict adherence to the traditions of the school.

Mentioning here the paths of spiritual development does not mean that everyone must follow them. In a sense, every person engages in self-development, often without even thinking about what they call what they do.

Unconsciously, a person chooses the direction that resonates with his inner world. Sometimes the direction of self-development is dictated by the need to acquire new skills to satisfy any needs, be they biological needs (for food, safety, material goods), social (to occupy a certain place in a social group, to receive respect and attention) or ideal (spiritual, cultural, aesthetic, meaning of life, etc.). And in this case, too, a person does not always make a choice consciously. Often circumstances develop in such a way that the choice of direction for self-development is, as it were, predetermined.

The most effective, but also the most dangerous, is a conscious choice of direction. The effectiveness of a conscious choice of direction is determined by the image of the expected future and the formation of a fairly specific goal in connection with this. The danger comes from attaching excessive importance and a distorted understanding of the meaning, when all efforts are spent on something that, in essence, is not self-development. This is where some people make the wrong choice of direction, lack of results and the resulting disappointment.

Why self-development is important

Ideal needs are the most important thing that distinguishes us, humans, from the rest of the living world. Self-development, along with spiritual, cultural and aesthetic needs, is an integral part of a normal healthy person. Even in people with extremely low levels of aspirations and in people with extremely low levels of intelligence, ideal needs can be found.

The importance of self-development lies precisely in the fact that, paying at least some minimal attention to it, a person still remains a person. Otherwise, either the person is seriously ill, or he is not a person.

Why engage in self-development

Only conscious self-development activities are highly effective and bring significant results. The effectiveness of conscious self-development is tens of thousands of times greater than the latent self-development of “life with the flow.” This difference is like the difference between a person walking and someone sitting straight on a chair. Anyone who walks will definitely end up somewhere. And the sitting one?

By engaging in self-development, a person fulfills a mission that carries the meaning of life, which, in turn, is beyond the boundaries of life. We can safely say that the meaning of life has evolutionary significance. And this is definitely related to development.

At the same time, the cessation of all efforts at self-development puts a person in a state of a completed program. And this is nothing more than the end of life. Whether it ends physically or not is not the point. It is important that instead of life there remains only existence without meaning and purpose.

Why does a person need self-development?

A simple thought follows from previous thoughts: a person needs self-development in order to be a human being, and not a biorobot.

Self-development is necessary in order to at least keep up with the times and be ready for changes in the world around us. We are not yet talking about a total change in ourselves. But the world is constantly changing, the environment and activities are changing. To withstand competition in life, at work, in business, you need to comply.

What is self-development for?

The answer to what self-development is for is very simple: for happiness. For different people this may be completely different information, but it is always associated with its acceptance by a specific person as success. Increasing self-esteem is always associated with an influx of enormous energy for creation. It is thanks to this energy that a person is able to achieve the most incredible peaks in his field of activity. Achievements, in turn, generate the very flows of energy that make a person happy. The circle closes. But the basis is all the same self-development. It was thanks to working on myself that success became possible, which brought energy for further development.

Self-development and its tasks

• The most basic task of self-development is to support the constant evolutionary growth of a person throughout his life.
• Ensure human competitiveness in society.
• Provide a competitive advantage in the interspecies struggle for human survival.
• Provide tools in the process of human self-actualization.
• Maintain a person’s level of self-worth.
• Maintain a sufficient level of self-esteem.

Self-development and its stages

I would not divide self-development into any stages because of its exceptional individuality and, in most cases, multiplicity. Just like the reasons why a person takes the path of self-development, the stages that a person goes through along this path have many options and interdependencies.

It is possible to single out only the stages of one cycle of self-development, as a completed gestalt:

1. Awareness of the need for change.
2. Forming an image of a desirable future.
3. Searching and studying ways to get what you want.
4. Choosing a path or method.
5. Directly actions related to the acquisition of new qualities.
6. Application of results in life.

By acquiring new qualities, a person automatically generates new requests, which are included in cycles of self-development and are implemented depending on the person’s abilities for self-development.

What sign characterizes self-development?

A person is the author of his own life, this is the most basic sign of self-development. The author of his own life in practice realizes its transformations, freedom of choice, determination of goals and plans in life, engages in self-education, subordinates himself to his goals and desires.

What self-development gives

Self-development gives a person’s life completeness and meaning.

Self-development as the highest form of development

Self-development as a type of development

Types of human development:

• Physical development: influence on the body, its weight, strength, proportions.
• Physiological development: influence on the nervous system, digestion, cardiovascular system, childbirth, etc.
• Mental development: sensations, perception of the environment, thinking, memory, feelings, imagination. Development of value orientations, abilities, interests.
• Social development: entry into society and various social relationships, social status.
• Spiritual development: self-awareness, self-knowledge, self-development, purpose in life, responsibility to others and to oneself, understanding of the nature of the universe and the desire for constant moral improvement.

As a rule, self-development is referred to as spiritual development. I would like to note that self-knowledge, self-development, and spiritual development are among the ideal needs of a person. But self-development as an activity is applicable to any type of development, characterized primarily by human initiative.

Therefore, it is more correct to talk about self-development not as a type of development, but as a form. Self-development is also a form of spiritual development.

Self-development and self-knowledge

Self-knowledge is a structural component of human self-awareness. This is the process of knowing yourself, your potential, your moral, intellectual, personal qualities and character traits.

The need for self-knowledge, along with other ideal needs, is a fundamental quality that distinguishes humans from animals.

Every person has questions “who am I,” “what is the meaning of my existence,” answers to which, as a rule, are not accepted from the outside. Only through self-knowledge can a person begin to answer these questions, although usually no one is satisfied with the answer, and this search is endless, since the inner universe of a person is inexhaustible.

Only through self-knowledge is it possible to gain psychological maturity and inner harmony, psychological and mental health of the individual. In addition, the only way for self-development and self-realization is through self-knowledge.

Self-development and self-knowledge are closely intertwined and interdependent phenomena, and it makes no sense to consider them separately.

Self-development and self-education

Self-education is the actualization of the need for self-development. This is a method by which self-development is realized, which consists of independent learning and mastering any skills.

Self-education is applicable to any type of human development. Its importance has increased thousands of times with the advent of the information age. Traditional education in many areas is hopelessly behind the rapidly changing demands of the time. At the same time, a person’s ability to self-educate allows him to acquire the latest knowledge and skills necessary to maintain his own effectiveness at a sufficient level.

The fact that self-education is selective and based on the internal mechanism of self-actualization makes it very effective and efficient. The results obtained in the process of self-education are of very high value for a person.

The advantages of self-education also include the opportunity to move at your own pace, according to your own plan or without it, not to waste time and money on unnecessary things and to learn from the best.

Learning to self-educate is a significant achievement on the path of self-development.

Self-development and self-realization

Self-realization is the need for the practical application of one’s talents, knowledge and desires. If a person follows the path of self-development, then self-realization is the place and method of transforming results into some kind of plus reinforcement: either fame, or power, or money, or warmth, love and respect.

There are many options for self-realization depending on the type of activity, gender and age. You can realize yourself to some extent by providing yourself with basic needs, and by obtaining the necessary social status, as well as on a spiritual, creative and cognitive path. As an example, this is literary, artistic or any other creativity, family, sports or professional.

Self-development is a process, and like any process, self-development is necessary to achieve a certain goal. The peculiarity of self-development is that goals always change, depending on the level of awareness, ability to take risks, self-discipline, self-confidence... All these criteria determine what goal we set for ourselves and how soon we will achieve this goal.

Personal self-development can be divided into several steps, we will talk about them below, but now let’s think about what motivates us, what forces us to get up and follow this interesting, sometimes difficult path of self-development.

So, as soon as we come into this world, we are surrounded by adults, our parents, perhaps brothers or sisters, grandparents. And, one way or another, they are older, stronger, smarter, wiser than us. And we unconsciously, sometimes consciously, compare ourselves with them, and this comparison is always not in our favor.

And it is precisely at this moment, when we are faced with the fact that we are in some way “worse” than the people around us, that a complex of insufficiency, described in detail by A. Adler, arises in us. In an effort to overcome this complex of insufficiency, we begin to engage in self-development.

The process of self-discovery

The first step in self-development is the process of self-discovery. We strive to identify ourselves in this world, position ourselves in our mental coordinate system, in relation to our idols, ideals, work colleagues, members of our family (both parental and the family that we have already created), religion, spiritual teachers and mentors... In general, we are looking for the answer to the question “who am I in this world?” This search can last a moment, but it can drag on for many years.

I have some shortcomings

The second step is to admit to myself that I have some shortcomings that lead me to undesirable consequences and results in life. And here self-acceptance plays a very important role. If we accept ourselves, then no problems arise with an objective view of the surrounding reality.

And we understand where we are and what (who) surrounds us. We may not like it, but we understand that it is so. As soon as our level of self-acceptance decreases, we begin to justify ourselves, to find people who, in our opinion, are “worse” than us. And this allows us not to change anything in our lives. And, therefore, the process of self-development ends.

And how I would like it to be

The third step comes if we do not give up, and openly look at our shortcomings (here it is important to understand that this is only our own subjective assessment of what are our shortcomings and what are our strengths), and begin to think about how I would like it to be . If not, then how? Often many people stop at this step.

Because we know how much we DO NOT WANT, but we don’t even think about what we WANT. And then we begin to complain about how bad our lives are, because we are surrounded by everything we don’t want and what we are trying to avoid (you can understand why this happens after watching the movie The Secret, everything is described in detail there). In this context, it is important for us to avoid the victim state and not shift responsibility for the cause of our dissatisfaction to others.

How to achieve the desired result

The fourth step is to see what ways I can achieve the desired result. What do I need to do to become what I want? And here on our way we can meet people, books, films, trainings that show different options and ways to achieve our goal.

And the help of other people is effective provided that we have already completed the first 3 steps on our own. Otherwise, it will turn out that we realize and justify other people’s expectations about us, about how they would like to see us, and this is far from self-development.

And perhaps you will get by without the help of others, and this is completely normal. However, when it comes to the need to consider as many different options as possible, then a detached, independent view is very useful.

And avoid those people who will insist on their opinion as the only true one, always reserve the right to choose and the right to doubt that the words and ideas of another person (or group of people) are one hundred percent correct. It may be true for them, but it doesn't matter to you. (However, like this article - perhaps these are just someone’s ideas that will not cause any response from you)

Steps to achieving your goal

And the last, fifth step is action. We make any efforts, take steps to achieve the goal that we set for ourselves in the 3rd step.

And at the end, we again move on to step number 1. We again begin to evaluate what we have achieved, what we are capable of, what place we occupy relative to those around us. And in fact, the process of self-development is endless; there will always be ideals to which we strive, in comparison with which we are not satisfied with our situation.

And this process stops either at the moment of death (which has not yet been proven), or at the moment when we stop believing in ourselves, in our strengths, our goal seems unattainable, and we stop, but only for a while...

Begins process of personal self-development from the moment when a person, having once wanted something, begins to think about how he can achieve it, and what prevents him from taking the first steps. The interesting thing is that once we receive a question, our brain constantly searches for an answer, even without the participation of consciousness. It includes the process of self-development of the individual, who, willy-nilly, absorbs all the necessary information, the brain itself goes through all possible options for solving the problem, and one day insight comes. But this process is too complicated and long.

First of all, it also requires some motivation. And each person motivates himself, since personal development is a strictly individual process. But in any case, whatever the motivation, the process of personal self-development leads to the same thing - a change in a person’s habitual thinking, a change in attitude towards the world, others and, of course, towards oneself.

The process of personal self-development is difficult, long and painful, since you have to fight with your own “I”, which does not want to recognize and accept changes in life. But stopping on this path is also stupid, since the process immediately starts in the opposite direction and everything previously achieved loses its value and returns you to a dull and unpleasant past. The main thing is not to lose heart. Be sure that always on the path of personal self-development you can meet a person who will help you, support you, and without demanding absolutely anything in return.

Methods and stages of personal self-development

Many people know that these issues are often dealt with by psychology; personal development is within its competence. But in fact, the process of personal self-development can consist of a variety of practices: meditation, faith, communication with other people, training, yoga, etc. But in any case, personal self-development goes through several stages.

1. Getting to know your own “I”, its features, as well as searching for ways to modify it. In this case, personal self-development helps not only to understand oneself and the world around us, but also to discover the relationship with childhood traumas, fears and problems of today. After this, all the talents and abilities that had no outlet before literally break through.

2. Next step Personal self-development is the reprogramming of one’s own actions and behavior. This helps transform sudden and unexpected success into regular and permanent success.

3. When such transformations become significant and acquire a permanent character, the world begins to play with new colors, and people treat you better and better.

What does personal self-development give?

Self-development of personality opens up new perspectives in life and in communicating with people. Life itself becomes brighter and more fulfilling, and most importantly, it begins to shine with new facets. New opportunities, friends, horizons, ideas, thoughts appear. The process of personal self-development allows you to make the world around you more harmonious, kind and filled with energy.