We are already in the last few days of January. If you’re looking for things to do to improve yourself, here are 20 practical and straightforward self-development tips:
20 ways to improve yourself
Do an online course
Learn a language
Learn to play a musical instrument
Start a business
Read more
Stick to an exercise routine
Eat healthier
Consume positive podcasts and videos
Practice deep rest and recuperation
Meditate regularly
Plan your goals and schedule time to work on them
Start journaling
Begin a 30-day challenge
Confront the fear of failure
Observe your emotional reactions
Develop a way to express yourself
Work with a licensed therapist
Identify ways to improve your relationships
Find new ways to meet people
Set relationship boundaries
I hope you found this helpful. Wishing you a beautiful week ahead.
Self-help or self-improvement is a self-guided improvement—economically, intellectually, or emotionally—often with a substantial psychological basis.
Self-help basically has to do with an individual striving to better their lives by themselves with little or no assistance from someone else.
There are several different topics within the personal development world, but they all seem to fall under five major categories.
Selfhelp categories
Mental
Social
Spiritual
Emotional
Physical
Mental
The first of the five areas of personal development is all about growing your mind. You can partake in many mental personal development activities. Some examples are taking a class, reading a book, or watching an informational YouTube video to improve your skills. By setting aside some time each day, or each week, you can see growth in your career, increased productivity, and so much more.
My favorite activities to do in this personal development category are reading books on my industry, listening to podcasts, and taking courses.
Social
This category is all about improving your communication. In my opinion, this category is the most overlooked. However, social personal development is an important activity to practice. Learning a new language, practicing your public speaking skills, and committing to doing more active listening are all activities that can help with social personal development.
Spiritual
Spiritual personal development can mean something different for each person. The best way that I know how to describe it is anything that brings you peace and helps you connect to your true self. The activities that fall under this category can be anything from spending time in prayer and reading your Bible, to taking a nature walk or meditating. For more examples check out this article.
Emotional
Emotional personal development can be, well, emotional. Because of this, it can be easy to brush it off. I’ve done my share of doing this. I have realized that it wasn’t healthy behavior. The reality is that holding in your emotions, and brushing them off, only makes it worse when they finally do come out. Some examples of what you can do here are journaling, tracking your mood, talking to a friend, or even a counselor.
Physical
We’ve made it to the last of five categories! By now I hope you are seeing that personal development, practiced right, is all about the whole self. We aren’t only focusing on one aspect of you here. That will be important to note when it comes time to choose your personal development activities.
Physical personal development is about a lot more than exercise. You’ll also want to consider eating and sleeping habits, to name a few, to get the full picture of this category. Some activity examples include working out, getting 7-9 hours of sleep each night, meal prepping, and going to regular checkups at your doctor’s office.
By creating healthier habits around exercise, healthy eating, and sleep you will be on your way to being your best physical self.
There is no better way to make the best use of 2023 than by being intentional about improving your life through self-help. I hope you live a more improved life this year. Do leave a comment if you found this post helpful.
Hope your new year has been good so far. Mine has been wonderful. ✌🏽
Writers Space Africa magazine. January 2023
As has become the norm, I got talking with the winner of African Teen Writers Awards (Prose category), Testimony Odey in the just published Writers Space Africa magazine.
The year began on a wonderful note as I’d had my baby, Bezaleel Midavaphee Mngueter Saviour on Christmas day, 25th December, 2021 and 1st January 2022 was his naming ceremony.
Bezaleel on his naming ceremony
The changes that came with motherhood were enormous; from lack of adequate sleep to breast sores, doubting my ability to care for my son appropriately, losing weight, having a gigantic appetite and many more. Finding a balance was hard work but for my supportive husband, Titus Anthony and my ever present and helpful parents in-law, Mrs. Sarah and Mr. Anthony Madugu who made it easier.
On the editing front, I moved from being one of the volunteer Children’s literature editors of the Writers Space Africa magazine to becoming the assistant chief editor. This saw me interviewing 12 different featured writers for the magazine; one for each month. I also started volunteering for the Crusaders Christian magazine as it’s first chief editor.
I got a job sometime in June doing what I love, writing with Jotscroll Media Company. Although the office is very far from where I live and it has been really tasking having to write about topics that I’m not very familiar with, I’ve weathered through and I’ve written over 70 articles in categories that include accounting, business, marketing, economics and finance. You can have a glimpse of all I’ve written on my Pinterest as I update it once a new article is published.
September to October were extremely stressful; I had to juggle taking care of my home, writing and sewing for my sister’s wedding. She gave me the privilege of sewing her wedding gown, traditional wedding dress and all the clothes for the family.
When she asked me, I was both elated and afraid. Elated because I’d always wanted to sew a wedding gown. I couldn’t sew mine due to my tight schedule at the time of my own. I was afraid because I did not have prior experience on sewing wedding dresses. Thus, my research on wedding dresses began.
When the wedding held on 26th November, 2022. I was extremely happy seeing my siblings and their children dressed in clothes I’d personally sewn. And the bride, beautifully clothed in her wedding dress. It gave me pleasure knowing that my 3 months of endless errands to the market, tedious hours on the sewing machine and sleepless nights were not in vain.
The wedding gown I made
As the year winds down, looking back at all I’ve been able to achieve and all that I’d been unable to achieve. I also look back on all that came my way which I did not expect. Although I’d wanted to publish 4 poetry anthologies and a book about my experience as a mother, I hope to achieve them next year with God’s help.
However the year has turned out for you, whether good or bad, remember that being alive is enough. Being able to read this blog post and understand the sentence construction is enough. Be grateful for every single second you have.
For the month of November, I interviewed the educational Rockstar, Writer and teacher, Namse Udosen.
Writers Space Africa magazine November 2022 cover
He shared interesting perspectives on the educational sector and writing. Read the interview as well as other interesting African literature when you get yourself a copy of the magazine here for free.
PPBlessing 