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The Secrets to Self-Awareness

By ThinkingNo Comments

The Secrets to:

self-awareness-image
Self-awareness.

Self-awareness is about understanding more about you. It’s about being aware of your thoughts, feelings, ego, knowledge, skills, experiences, relationships, communication, strengths & weaknesses, drives and behaviours in a situation. Self-awareness isn’t something you do just once or occasionally. It should be an on-going day by day, hour by hour, moment by moment task.

There are numerous benefits to being more self-aware. A good example is that you can use self-awareness to change how you respond to different discussions and events to get better outcomes. It is just about you being aware of yourself and how you influence others. Nobody can be self-aware at all times, but you can make yourself more self-aware.

So how do you become more self-aware? Here’s my suggestions, based on research online and my own experiences:

1. Observation
Observe everything going on around you. Including yourself and how you interact with others.

2. Reflection
Reflect on just about everything. It could be a past experience, or reflecting on something you’ve learned or read. Consider:

  • Who? What? Why? How? When?
  • What were your thought?
  • What were your feelings?
  • What were your behaviours? How did others behave?
  • What outcome did you want? Did you get it? If not, what could you do differently?
  • What did you learn? How can you use this learning in the future?

People have lots of different ways of reflecting. Some good ideas include: meditation, keeping a daily journal and counselling sessions (using the counsellor as a sort of sounding board).

Two important things about reflection:
1. You’ve got to practice reflection to get good at it.
2. It has to become a regular behavioural habit.

3. Balanced Thinking
When observing or reflecting ensure that your thinking is balanced. When it comes to ourselves we are often too critical and only see the negatives. Be fair and kind to yourself. Recognise both the positives and negatives.

4. Develop Your Emotional Intelligence
Emotional intelligence is about being able to recognising how you are feeling and the emotions of others around you. A good way of developing emotional intelligence is to replay past situations in your mind and consider what emotions people in the situations (including yourself) were experiencing.

Emotional intelligence will enable you to have more control of your emotions, when/how you express them and being able to influence others on an emotional level.

It might also be worth learning more about body language as 80% of communication is non-verbal.

5. Honest Feedback
Honest feedback about yourself is important for self-awareness. Any feedback should come from a person that only wants to help you to improve yourself. If you suspect that feedback coming from a person is because of their own self-interest or because of another agenda, think carefully about its bias.

You can get feedback from family, friends, work colleagues, customers, practically anyone. Usually all you have to do is ask.

It’s good to know about the 5 to 1 ratio. The person giving you feedback should give you 5 authentic compliments to 1 piece of specific constructive criticism.

The person you ask for feedback may not of heard of the 5 to 1 ratio. So it might be worth discussing it with them prior to asking for feedback. It would also be good if you started using the 5 to 1 ratio when you give feedback to others.

6. List Your Strengths and Weaknesses
Make a list of your strengths and weaknesses. Celebrate your strengths and develop weaknesses.

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7. Encourage Open Questions
Encourage open questions that stimulate debate and discussion in all areas of your life. Debating and discussing opinions is a really good way to become more self-aware and develop awareness of others.

8. Know Your Story
The stories we tell ourselves, especially those about ourselves give insight to all things self-awareness. So know your story. Know how your past influences your now and how it could potentially impact on your future. Listen carefully to the narrative.

If there narrative is highly negative or too critical, you may want to sit down and rewrite your story on paper. Once you’ve done that start telling yourself and others your new story.

9. Life Goals
Write down your life goals. This exercise is brilliant for self-awareness, especially if you do the introspection as you develop your life goals.

10. Coaching
I’ve never had coaching. But there seems to be a widely held belief that good coaching encourages self-awareness. I can see how this would work. Like most things, the more you put into coaching in terms of self-awareness the more you’ll get out of it.

11. Our Own Version of the Truth
Two people can experience the same event, yet have completely different perspectives and views about it. We all have our own version of the truth. Remember this.

12. Psychometric tests
There are many psychometric tests available, each with its own Pros and Cons. Perhaps the most well-known is the Myers Briggs Type Indicator (MBTI) based on the work of Carl Jung, a psychoanalyst. You can take a MBTI test for free and view your results here.

Useful Online Resources
5 Ways to Become More Self-Aware – Harvard Business Review
Ways to Improve Your Self-Awareness – Cleverim
Know Thyself: How to Develop Self-Awareness – Psychology Today

Write soon,

Antony

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My Thirtieth Birthday

By Friends & Family, Happiness & Joy, Life, Thinking3 Comments

Yesterday I Became:
30

Thirty years old. It was a busy day with many highlights. My close family and I went out for a meal in my favourite restaurant Gallimore’s. I was so pleased that almost everyone could and did come. Here are photos of my cake and balloons:

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My 30th Birthday Cake: Minion Bob.

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My 30th Birthday Balloons.

Gallimore’s Fine Restaurant served sublime and tasty food and the service was excellent. My thanks to Gallimore’s for making my birthday even more special.

I was completely overwhelmed by the kindness and generosity from my family and friends on my birthday. I want to say thank you from the bottom of my heart for all the Facebook messages, the cards, the balloons, the gifts and the money from family and friends.

At the end of the month, some good friends and I are going to Chester Zoo to see the new Islands Exhibit.

Big birthdays always cause me to reflect on my life so far. I think about what I’ve done and not done. What I’ve experienced and haven’t experienced. I play what if scenarios out in my head for both the past and the future.

We are all a work in progress. We are constantly growing as we experience life and learn. I am proud of what I’ve achieved in life so far. I could list my achievements like overcoming adversity, becoming and being a good Nurse, being creative and my ongoing recovery from a mental health illness.

But the thing I’m most proud of is to have a wonderful loving family and a bunch great friends whom I would trust with my life.

Write soon,

Antony

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Review: A Marvellous Massage by a Masseur found using GuysWay

By Gay, Happiness & Joy, Health, ReviewsNo Comments
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GuysWay – The Ultimate Male Masseur Directory in the UK

Being a Reviewer has its perks. Like being offered the opportunity to review the experience of finding a Masseur on GuysWay and having a massage. Naturally, I jumped at the chance.

Within two clicks on GuysWay I had found a professional, gay-friendly massage therapist local to where I live. It couldn’t have been easier.

On GuysWay my first click was to select my geographical area, which resulted in a list of local Masseurs. The second click to select a profile of a Masseur that took my fancy. I had the option to make a quick phone call, text or email to book.

I booked with a gorgeous Moroccan named Saeed via email. As well as having a profile on GuysWay he has his own website where he offers his massage services. Saeed happens to be the Owner of GuyWay. On my arrival at his house, I felt instantly at ease with Saeed. We spoke a little about GuysWay.

Saeed was quick to reassure me that the order Masseurs are displayed on local listing pages are always random, meaning that no Masseur gets preference over another. He explained that he had set up GuysWay because he had seen a gap in the market. There were directories that were slightly sleazy and seedy offering additional services to massage, but no gay-friendly Professional Masseur Directories out there. I had to agree with this, prior to GuysWay, I had always found it difficult to find a good Masseur.

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Saeed’s Massage Room

Saeed led me upstairs to his massage room. The room had an air of comfort to it. Candles, low-lighting and background music created a calming atmosphere. I undressed, leaving my underwear on to maintain my modesty and climbed on to the message table. I had opted for a deep tissue massage.

Saeed started on my shoulders, working his way down my body using massage oil liberally. His hands were like magic. They were warm, muscular, applied the perfect amount of pressure and moved in rhythm with the music. The feel on skin-on-skin contact was stimulating, sensual and very relaxing. I found myself being transformed into a blissfully calm and carefree state. Throughout the massage, I had the option to talk or just lie there and enjoy.

The message was just what I needed. It left me feeling both relaxed and energised. It was fantastic and left me wanting to take Saeed’s hands home with me.

Afterwards I thought about the experience. I decided that massage is essential for everyone’s wellbeing. Massage has so many benefits. For me this massage helped to reduce my stress levels, enabled me to unwind and get a goodnight of restful sleep.

I’ll definitely be booking another delightful and marvellous massage with Saeed in the future. Hopefully making massages with Saeed a regular thing.

Review soon,

Antony

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Book Review: Faitheist by Chris Stedman

By Books & Authors, Gay, Reviews, ThinkingNo Comments
faitheist-chris-stedman-book-cover Chris Stedman is an atheist with a humanistic ethical code. Stedman, through his interfaith work, encourages the religious and nonreligious to come together and share their stories to humanise and understand one another for the greater good. He is the Assistant Humanist Chaplain at Harvard University and writes on his blog NonProphet Status, for the Huffington Post as well as on various other media platforms.

In Faitheist, Chirs Stedman shares the story of his life (so far). The full title of the book is longwinded (Faitheist: How an Atheist Found Common Ground with the Religious) and the introduction is off-putting. The introduction is full of terminology that is unfamiliar, unless you’re an Atheist Activist or an Interfaith Worker/Volunteer. This terminology and the elongated words are both unnecessary.

But get past the introduction and Stedman’s story is fascinating. Told in his warm and engaging writers voice his story is educational, enlightening, completely honest and emotionally resonant.

Stedman starts with his childhood; describing it as ‘not particularly religious.’ He discusses his search for a place to belong and a community to be a part of. Towards the end of his childhood he joins a church and becomes a Christian.

Stedman moves into his adolescence and tells us of his developing homosexuality. He describes a difficult time in his life, one where his sexuality and his extreme Christian beliefs are at odds. He discusses his self-hate, guilt and his loss of faith in God. He reveals how his mum discovered that he was gay and how she supported him. Lost, Stedman sets out on journey to find himself.

Stedman tells of his early adulthood; describing his journey to find himself and what he wants to do with his life. He tells that through Voluntary & Community Work he served others (a recurring theme throughout his entire life), he realised that the religious and nonreligious need to work together (interfaith working). He explains that he realised this has to start with understanding one another’s perspective.

Stedman writes about his set and strong convictions towards the end of this book, clearly promoting humanism. However he has a history of changing some of his views, based on his life experiences. So this left the question as to whether some of his views may change over time. Not his core values, those have always remained a constant, but some of his views on complex ‘grey’ areas in life.

As Stedman shares his story he describes his patchwork of tattoos and their meaning to him and his life. Stedman demonstrates his wonderful ability to reflect on his own experiences and learn from them. He reveals his unique passion, vibrant personality and how so alive he is. A gorgeous man with a beautiful, caring soul.

Stedman concludes his book, not surprisingly, advocating the bringing together of the religious and the nonreligious (atheists). He suggests that they should share their life stories with one another. This he states will lead to a better understanding of one another, so that they can work better together. He encourages the reader to open a dialogue with people from all walks of life, to listen to their stories and share yours.

Stedman could have included some glossy photo pages to match his autobiographical style of story sharing, which would have been great for visual learners.

Faitheist by Chris Stedman is a thought-provoking read and will appeal to anyone who is interested in the study of religious or atheism, the effect of religion on homosexuality, humanism, philosophy, ideology, interfaith work and/or bringing communities together.

Faitheist: How an Atheist Found Common Ground with the Religious by Chris Stedman is available to buy on Amazon.

Review soon,

Antony



I aim for posts on this blog to be informative, educational and entertaining. If you have found this post useful or enjoyable, please consider making a contribution by Paypal:


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