The Art and Science of Personal Development by Darbright Ng

It's an Art because what works for one person may not work for another, as it involves self-discovery, testing ideas and gaining self consciousness and other intuitive processes. Yet it is a Science because there are certain steps that can be taken and knowledge that can be learned in order to aid and accelerate the process of personal growth.
Have you ever wondered why people are interested in the subject of Personal Development and improving themselves?
The main motivation behind most self-improvement is to better one's knowledge, skills and thinking. And in the process of developing oneself, the aim is to improve the quality of one's existence, either in the mind, in the emotional experience of life, or in the physical and tangible aspect of material possessions.
If there's something you'd like to learn, or improve in, the question is how does one start? Is there any step by step process that you can follow to help you improve?
I've outlined some steps below that might be helpful to you in your personal growth.
The Journey of Personal Development
Personal Development begins by developing your mind and raising your conscious awareness. And with a higher level of conscious awareness, one is then able to deliberately and consciously go about creating and choosing one's experience in life.
When you have decided clearly what it is that you want, the next step you can take is to identify the key factors crucial for success in your journey. The following steps are pretty basic, but outline a simple process that many people don't follow:

Set a Goal
Research and Identify Key Success Areas
Follow Through on the Key Success Areas

In setting your goal, it could be anything. But in this case of developing yourself, your goal may be to learn something new, or develop a skill. You could be considering learning how to do public speaking, or maybe even something that you've never done before, like going diving!
After you've set the goal, do some research on what it takes to accomplish that goal. For example, in the case of diving you would require to take and pass a diving course. Then you would follow on with what are the diving schools available in your area, how much they cost, the reputation and quality of their instructors, timing of the lessons and so on.
Once you've done your research, all you really need to do right now is set the time aside and follow through on it. Having an idea of what to expect makes following through on your goal a lot easier! Most of the time, it's not knowing where to start or what to expect that holds people back from learning something new.
Conclusion
While there are other ways to learn something new, like jumping head first into a project or new experience without any clue, I prefer to have some idea of what to expect!
My experience is that personal development takes time, effort and desire.
Time - because we need to learn new knowledge and deliberately practice our skills;
Effort - because we have to do something to gain something and that's by converting the energy of our effort into tangible results;
Desire - because when you really want what you want, you'll automatically think about it every day, find ways around and through roadblocks that might be in your path, and pick yourself up when you're down.
So in summary, what are the basic steps for Personal Development?

Everything begins with an idea, or a goal in mind. For example, what skill or area would you like to develop next?
Doing the necessary research to have a better understanding of your chosen goal. For example, what does your goal really mean? What are the ways to accomplish it?
Identifying the key areas for success, and
Follow through on learning and developing those key areas

The question now is for you:
What do you really want to accomplish? Do you have a goal?
Darbright runs Personal Development Made Simple @ http://www.darbright.com a website devoted to making a life of freedom and abundance possible through Personal Growth.
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