“Everything that irritates us about others can lead us to an understanding of ourselves.” – Carl Gustav Jung

Being humans, we believe that we are entitled to have opinions about almost anything we come across. We judge others easily based on their behaviors and actions. But when it comes to us, do we really know who we are? Well, the answers to this question might be different for different individuals. Some may not get tired of bragging about themselves while others may fumble on the proper words to describe themselves. But whatever may be the case, this will just sum up to your introduction or portrayal of your identity, achievements, status in society, etc.

Then, what exactly this term “Self-awareness” means? It means your perception about yourself, about your personality, about your choices, actions, feelings, behaviour…”YOU!” Mostly, there is a confusion between consciousness and self-awareness. A sociologist named George Herbert Mead gave a clear distinction between the two, when the attention is outwards towards environment, it depicts the consciousness and self-awareness is when the focus is inward towards the self. We receive the signals from the environment, process them and then respond accordingly, so we can say we are conscious of our environment, but the real struggle is about the self-awareness. It is knowing how we will respond to a particular situation based on our personality, beliefs and choices.

But, why do we need to have this self-awareness? Because the more we are aware of our feelings and emotions, the easier it is to manage them and also to respond to the feelings and emotions of others. Being self-aware helps us to understand ourselves in a better way, to know our strengths, weaknesses, needs, drives, etc. Individuals with high self-awareness tend to have a balanced attitude. They neither trivialize any situation nor make it awful. Understanding ourselves better is also helpful in dealing with others. We can identify with others in a better way, be empathetic towards them and manage our relationships better. Overall, self-awareness helps us to improve both our personal as well as social life.

So, now the question arises, what exactly we should do to develop self-awareness? Let’s try to answer this question. Few ideas which I find useful in developing self-awareness are mentioned here.

• Observe your emotions: One of the important steps to develop self-awareness is to observe our emotions closely because our emotions greatly influence our state of mind, our thought process and our finally our behaviour. We are usually very ignorant about our emotions. There is a spectrum of emotions, we experience every day, and we have different triggers for different emotions. So, if we pay attention to how we feel exactly, we are able to manage our emotions well and also respond to various situations in a better way.
• Learn your strengths and weaknesses: This is yet another important step in development of self-awareness. When we actually put efforts to understand the things, we are good at and the things we need to improve, that helps us to know ourselves in a better way. We have a tendency to overlook our strengths and crib about our weaknesses and that makes us unhappy. Instead, if we focus on the strengths, we can accentuate our personality and push ourselves further. In the same way, we could find the ways to improve in the areas we lack behind instead of just complaining about it. This helps us to build on a healthy self-awareness.
• Journaling: This is what I feel, another way best to develop self-awareness. There is almost a diverse array of emotions we experience all along a day and sometimes we are not even aware of how we exactly feel and why we react the way we do. Jotting down our feelings can actually help us to understand them better. We can identify the triggers which develop negative feelings in us and also find out what exactly makes us happy. If we develop a habit of journaling daily, we can respond better to our triggers as we could get different perspectives of the situation and our responses even when the event has already occured. This is turn be helpful in building self-awareness and positive personality.
• Be more open about new experiences: Sometimes, we tend to be so conservative and rigid in our thinking patterns that we seize to grow and enhance our personality. Being open and seeking newer experiences help us to understand how we respond to sudden changes and cope up with newer situations. There are certain circumstances which we accept very easily whereas some experiences are most difficult and uncomfortable to deal with. So, when we have openness for facing something new, it is easier to develop self-awareness.

Now we know that self-awareness focusses on identifying and managing our emotions. In the present world, self-awareness proves to be an important skill to develop because when we are able to manage our emotions, we can potentially impact the range of emotional spectrum displayed within a family, at workplace or in a social setting.

Last but not least, building self-awareness is a continuous process and believe this journey is definitely worthwhile! Always remember,

“Your worst enemy cannot harm you as much as your own unguarded thoughts!”