Knowing and being yourself is an ongoing process that makes life exciting and worthwhile. It’s not a one-and-done thing but a continuous and evolutionary journey.
Getting to know yourself actively leads to personal growth and positivity. Two key elements in this process are identifying your core values and recognizing your strengths. Often, we do this as part of career development, but these elements are truly personal and worth pursuing independently.
Core values guide us and stay relatively consistent throughout our adult lives. As children and teens, we discover and test these values. As adults, we refine them into essential principles. See the links below for an on-demand course I used, developed by Robert Glazer, author of Friday Forward.
Although I had a general sense of my core values, it had been a while since I’d put energy into capturing and committing to them. The process brought a lot of peace and confidence (Zenergy, I might say) to my life. With a clear sense of your core values, you have a framework for your choices, decisions, and commitments. Finding your core values is reflective and forward-thinking. It starts with asking yourself what’s important, what’s non-negotiable, and what feels right.
Similarly, our strengths are somewhat inherent. Recognizing and developing them serves us well. That’s not to say you can’t learn new skills, but skills differ from strengths. When you know your strengths, you can focus on things that come naturally rather than getting frustrated with things that don’t. One thing I discovered using the Clifton StrengthsFinder assessment with my work teams is that it helps to understand a team’s makeup.
For example, we used to have lively, energetic meetings full of ideas with one client, yet none of the ideas were implemented. Once we looked at individual strengths, we realized we had strategists and relationship builders but few with strengths in executing. That realization changed everything. We acknowledged what was missing and identified who we needed to move from idea to action. The meetings became even more energetic, and we made progress together.
The same is true in family and friendships. It’s fun to share some of the same strengths, but it’s even better when you complement each other. Your strength plus my strength equals incredible possibilities and realities together.
Because I believe in the StrengthsFinder assessment, I gave my children a copy of the book on Mother’s Day a few years ago. Seeing where there is crossover and where their individual strengths lie was enlightening. Now that they have careers, it continues to serve us to know ourselves and be ourselves.
Two Links Du Jour:
Get Clarity on Your Most Important Principles – Robert Glazer
Clifton StrengthsFinder 2.0 – Gallup
Two Minutes Du Jour 