Personal Development or personal power, we hear a great deal about it well look at Wikipedia there are 116 pages devoted to the phrase, no wonder most people are confused by the term, although it is a popular phrase used by so called 'Gurus' selling personal development training.
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We were born with unrealized potential and most strive through their lives to make them better through education and job prospects but is this what we call personal development?
So just what is Personal Power or Personal Development training?
It is very much a mental thing, trying to be the best person you can be is one of the power driving forces to help you achieve goals. You look at other people, some of them as role models, and try to integrate some of their personality into your own. But this is just not practical and is the reason many people feel a sense of failure when they try personal development traing courses and goal setting tools. They can read personal development books attend personal development seminars but they will never be like their role models.
The reality of your life today is a reflection of the sum of your thoughts until this day.
So if your current situation is the result of all the thoughts that you have, and you have on average 50,000 personal thoughts a day, some people have one thought 50,000 times! Personal Development is all about changing what you do now and getting different results than you have had in your past?
Most people simply want to improve their quality of life they do n ot need to earn millions to do it; Perhaps all your past experiences have shown a lack of results, so is it still possible to realize all of your personal dreams and spirations? Since childhood most of us have been held in check by parents, relatives, teachers and peer groups, their best intentions to save us from disappointment have been geared toward telling us not to expect too much we will only be disappointed.
No wonder self styled professional 'Gurus' earn vast fortunesestablishing seminars, telling us what we should be doing to improve our lot, without really coaching us how to do it, well that is in the next power lesson which costs an extra $x,000 and helps keep them rich and us poor. Thirsting for the next secret advertised will not get you that personal power found in self improvement .
Whilst it is true to say that whatever level of personal development you are at you do need a framework in order to know if improvement has actually occurred, what you do not need is the latest 'Whizz bang super-dooper piece of software that will power you to smart goal achievement'.
They tell you that they know something you do not and that is why you feel frustrated at your lack of personal development you will feel compelled to pull out more and more of your hard earned money to discover the secret, when there is no secret anyway.
Just as a building need a strong framework so do you to keep on track? Well you need some sort of smart goal or benchmark to aim for because you need to define the end-point, you need plans and strategies to measure and assess your progress toward the end, and you need milestones set out so that you can reward yourself for making progress on the way. In every journey you need some sort of feedback to know just where you are and are you on track.
Would you set off on a long unfamiliar journey without first looking at a map for guidance.Even then you would set milestones on the route to measure how far you had covered and how far you had to go. Keep your money in your pocket I can tell you all you need to know from my past experience of personal development work.
Well there is one secret to successful personal development, smart goal setting, motivation call it what you will let me tell you what personal development training it is....?
A while back, my daughter asked me to name three must-read books in my field - which is, of course, Personal Development. It didn't take much thinking - right away, I answered that my top three recommendations would be:
How to Find Your Real Self by Mildred Mann
The 7 Spiritual Laws of Success by Deepak Chopra
The 7 Habits of Highly Effective People by Stephen Covey
That, I believe, is also the best sequence in which to read them. In this article, I am going to outline why I think these books are essential reading for any student of the subject. Let's take each of them in turn ...
There is only one message in Mildred Mann's book, but it is an important message and one that I hope you will take on-board. It is this ... you are here to fulfill a purpose - you are not an accident - your life has meaning and value.
The book is beautifully written and it is the only one of my three recommendations that is in the public domain - that means, you can get a copy for free and read it for yourself; which is something I hope you will do!
Deepak Chopra's book the 7 Spiritual Laws of Success is the product of much thinking and soul-searching. In it, he outlines the path to success being revealed as a consequence of being connected with the universal mind of God. I particularly like the language of this book - it is almost like reading poetry at times. It is really rich and full of goodness - you feel better for just reading or listening to the words. Personally I have the book on CD and I play it in my car, from time to time, on long journeys.
The 7 Spiritual Laws are sequential and you will find that they build on the message and work of Mildred Mann. Though Mildred Mann writes from the Christian tradition and Deepak Chopra writes from a Buddhist perspective, I personally find no contradictions or difficulties in the essential content.
For many people who have studied Law-of-Attraction-style books and courses, there seems to be a missing link between the spiritual side of the process of creation/manifestation and the practical side of the process. That gap is perfectly bridged with Stephen Covey's book The 7 Habits of Highly Effective People.
The 7 Habits is a well-adjusted approach to achieving success in life; balancing the need for development of character against the need for working creatively with other people. Frequently, people do not see the need for developing character as a basis for personal growth, but that message is central to the book.
It is a sequential approach - easy to understand, but deceptively powerful. In my experience, not everyone can immediately grasp the true power of these behavioral habits, but when they are applied to your life and they become a part of the way you operate, you can produce truly outstanding results - you can achieve whatever you set out to do.
If you take the time to read these three classic works and let the important messages sink in, you will find that they do complement each other, but they each focus on a different aspect of the subject. So you will get a wonderfully complete and holistic view of how to go about achieving real success in life.