Troubleshooting personal development

If you understand this process by which desire effectively translates into results you can save yourself a lot of time, effort, and potentially save your development altogether. Personal change is always going to be challenging, but it needn’t be futile. If you’re having trouble sticking to a commitment, or it feels like you’re putting in a lot of work but getting very little in return, then you might find some useful guidance in this article.

 

 

The number one thing which most people seem to have a problem with when it comes to continued personal development is motivation.

 

It’s a popular conversational piece for people to talk about new year’s resolutions in tatters. Or for people who commit to a new exercise regime to give up after only a few weeks.

 

I haven’t suffered from this problem in years because I always get my desire straight to begin with. If was probably one of my greatest discoveries early on in personal development that honing in on the right desire can produce epic amounts of personal motivation and energy.

 

You know when you’ve got this right because the idea should send pulses through your soul. You could feel a hungry craving to begin right away just when you think of it.

 

If you don’t feel that. There’s a problem.

 

Do not assume that just because you think you want something means that you actually DO want it. Likewise, don’t assume that just because you really did want something two years ago means that you still want it right now.

 

Society and expectations also have a lot of answer for when it comes to straw-man desires.

 

How many people think they want a big house, marriage and a car? But do they REALLY?

 

Think about it, do you? If so, why? What is it about that idea you really want? Are you really that familiar with your own fantasy.

 

Unless you feel your eyes light up, unless you could easily whip out a 10000+ word essay on exactly everything about this dream that makes your heart beat quicken at the thought then you need to reassess what you thought you wanted.

 

It might even be a good idea to not just think about changing a little detail here and there, but in-fact abandoning any and all (style) preconceptions you had about your own desire and starting completely from scratch.

 

Just think… what do you want out of life? What thing do you absolutely crave in the core of your being?

 

There’s no better way to really waste a mountain-load of desire fuelled energy than to grind yourself to the bone on ineffectual random unplanned things. I know because I did it enough times before I realised my mistake.

 

There’s no doubt about it – a really powerful desire can give you consistent powerful motivation to act again and again. But if you don’t have a good plan, that is to say, if you don’t actually have an idea of some effective things you can do, then you’re reduced to firing off random spurts of energy into the world and hoping everything works out.

 

If you bought a new TV for your 26^th floor room of a city apartment block would you carry it into the elevator, carry it up the stairs, or, even worse, walk repeatedly into a wall. All actions take energy, some have different results, and all have different levels of efficiency. One of them gets the result very easily and leaves you with plenty of energy to spare. One of them takes tons of energy and may even result in you giving up on your desire for the result altogether.

 

The example may be simplistic and a little silly, but exactly the same thing happens in personal development all the time. Someone decides what they want, gets a good focus on their desire for it, and then they go stomping into the world with tons of energy only to fire it all away into something they’ve barely even thought about.

 

Some time later they return, dejected and exhausted. Their desire is drained, their energy is wasted, and they’ve learnt almost nothing from the experience.

 

Planning is really important.

 

Don’t just think up one plan, think of ten. Then try one, see how it feels, but don’t fully commit. Try another… try a few more. Which one really seems right? Which one gives you a hint of your reward in the distance?

 

People are all too eager to get out there and ruse towards what they think is the finish line, but oftentimes you can save yourself a ton of energy by doing a little more testing before you fully commit to one continued course of action.

 

 

Persistence, persistence, persistence. Think Henry Ford and Christopher Columbus.

 

Once you have committed to not waver until you get your results. If you begin to find motivation a problem – go back to the start of this article and reassess your desire. If it’s still there, keep on ploughing. Until you know for absolute definite that you took the wrong course or action you have to see something through once you’ve committed.

 

If the worst comes to the worst and it turns out you were wrong – well at least you’ve learnt a few new things along the way. Now it’s time to get planning again.

 

 

Most of the time it’s even better than you dared to imagine ;)

 

What’s the best thing to do then? Well if you’re like me then you start the whole thing over again and find out what’s next.