The Stages Of Personal Development

Personal development is a vast topic, which has many stages and involves a lot of continuous effort through time. There isn’t really a thing that will set you for life through a short burst (well, maybe there is but just financially). In the context of character growth, personal development is a life-long quest with no end point.

We learn, as long as we are alive and curious enough to absorb more and grow.In this article, we’re going to talk about the stages of personal development and how to recognize and work with them.

Don’t Look For Shortcuts

The vast majority of people want to have it easy in life, without realizing that proper personal development is a system that has many stages, which require a certain amount of time and effort.

Shortcuts for short-term goals are the usual mindset for many people becoming more aware of their personal development, while in reality, it is nothing but a long-term process. Now, the main concept of personal development and growth is to acquire new knowledge, new skills and to go out of your comfort zone.

Think about it, no one achieved something great by being warm and cozy, right?

The Stages Of Personal Development

As we already mentioned, personal development is a process that goes through different stages, all the time.

Stage #1 – Self-awareness

For the most part, people act in a predictable way, repeating the same actions, feelings, thoughts and emotions. Once you become aware of those though, you have the opportunity to start analyzing yourself.

That exact self-analysis is the fundament of personal development, as it helps you learn more about yourself, your needs and interests. Think of this as your inner compass.

Stage #2 – Comparison

Once your personal development starts giving you results, you may find yourself being more social and observing/analyzing other people. From that analysis comes the comparison between you and your peers, making it easy for you to differentiate between the different types of behavior, which produce certain results and outcomes.

More often than not, such social behaviors and interactions, may lead to a good value exchange – You learn something from someone and vice versa.

Stage #3 – The point of no return

When you eat the fruits of your labor, you are in stage 3 of your personal development process. During this stage, you break through the mental barrier and start thinking about all the things you can do to make your life better, along with the life of others around you.

During this stage, you start learning new knowledge and skills exponentially fast and get a burst of inspiration.

Stage #4 – Acceptance

Once the curtain of your limiting beliefs and thought patterns is pulled away, you are in a limitless mindset.

In your head, you can achieve anything and everything, but you now know and accept that even though sudden bursts of inspiration do happen, the process requires discipline and dedication. This is where you have to further look through your priority list, modify it, set short and long-term goals and plan everything out, pen on paper.