Self reflection should be more than a minor consideration if you’re serious about personal growth. I can testify that it’s worked wonders for me, for grounding myself and evaluating my life’s progress. How else am I supposed to make improvements, if I don’t know where I’ve gone wrong in the past? Many people try to ignore past errors, but then history repeats itself, as we all know.
Here are some questions that I find useful to use for self reflection. The format that I use is that of a weekly self assessment and reflection journal. Try it yourself, ask yourself the following questions Sunday night, when your week is complete.
1. What will I try to improve on next week?
2. What was I most proud of this week?
3. What was my biggest accomplishment this week?
4. What have I done to get closer to my life goals this week?
5. What was hard for me this week, and why?
6. What was my biggest waste of time this week?
7. What did I do this week that made me ashamed?
By answering these questions for myself in my writing journal, or journal diary as it is sometimes called, I force myself to take a hard look at myself. I may spend months or years treading water, not getting anywhere, if I didn’t take this time to analyze myself.
For me a week is enough time to pull myself back if I’ve gotten too far off-course. If I’ve stopped exercising for a week, I would be ashamed of myself, and my weekly review would get me to the gym first thing Monday morning.
By recording things that made me proud and that I consider my biggest accomplishments, I can emulate them in the future. The benefit for me is that these are the things that make me feel good and are likely taking me towards my life goals.
I record the activities that I’ve found to be hard during the week. Maybe it was a test, or a work out at the gym. I can then analyze where I went wrong, or right. A test being hard could mean that I wasn’t prepared enough, or it was meant to be a challenging critical thinking exam. A hard day at the gym could mean that I’ve let myself get out of shape, or I’m over working myself. I can make adjustments for the following week and plan accordingly.
What things will you discover yourself if you stare these seven hard questions dead in the eyes?
