One of the greatest discoveries you can ever make in life is discovering who you truly are. Knowing more about yourself will bring about your authenticity and unleash the more confident, badass you. When I’m working with clients, we focus on these learn ways to learn more about who you are.
Self-Knowledge is simply understanding who your authentic self is. It’s about taking the time to get to know yourself because often, we lose sight of ourselves. We are changing every day, so when we aren’t taking the time to reflect, to ask ourselves hard questions, and to explore the depths of who we are – we don’t know who we are anymore.
Not having self-knowledge can hold you back because you are unable to make choices, create direction, or have clarity in your life if you don’t know enough about who you are and what your desires are.
When we start to slow down, we can begin to understand our reactions, our deeper emotions, and how to be prepared for the things that normally get us down.
I chat about this with Connor McCreesh on my podcast, Embracing Human. In this episode, we discuss:
- How self-awareness improves every element of your life
- Building control of emotions and reactions
- Determining core values for better decision making
- Mission and fulfillment are more valuable than happiness
Listen here:
Identify Your Core Values
Discovering core values has been the biggest game changer for me and my clients! It’s the number one tool that I now use for decision making, rather than overthinking everything as I used to do.
Values are the basic and deep rooted beliefs or ethics individuals hold. They tend to motivate our actions, our sense of right or wrong, our political views, etc. Our core values are generally only a handful of values that we find the most important.
We all have a different set of core values. Once we determine our own, we can see how our values line up with the people we love and where they don’t. Generally, we have conflicts with people when they don’t share the same values.
A super basic way to look at your core values is to simply look through a list of values and select the ones that feel important to you. Even if you end up with a list of 20 values, most likely they’ll overlap and you’ll find 3 – 6 core values that are a deep fit.
In my Self Discovery toolkit, I take you through a super detailed way to figure out your core values. I also have a free mini training on my top exercises for finding your core values in my Remote Yogis Worldwide FB group. Join the group and check it out 🙂
Identify Your Driver
We all have drivers that motivate our actions and keep us moving in the direction of our dreams. Sometimes, we have temporary drivers that encourage us to do things in the short term, but I really like to focus on our lifetime drivers.
Your “driver” is often the same thing as your “why.” Simon Sinek often talks about the importance of finding your why within a career or workspace.
Often, it’s easy to figure our your drivers in a short term space. A bride may be inspired to work out because her driver is to look a certain way in her wedding dress. A father may quit smoking because he is driven to feel healthier in order to play with his kids.
Your short term “why” can help you stay motivated towards your goal, but I really encourage people to find their lifetime why.
Think of it like your personal mission statement. Why drives you to get out of bed every day and chase after your dreams?
For me? I’m actually driven by the desire to be a kick ass mom one day and do everything in my power to make the world a better place for my future children.
Your driver will look really different from mine and there’s no judgement over what drivers are “right” or “wrong.” They’re simply what motivate you to do what you do. When you’re clear on it, you can high light your driver when you’re needing a pick-me-up.
Identify Your Beliefs
What is the main cause of depression? Lack of hope.
The reason I find it’s important to define your beliefs, especially those related to a higher power of any kind, is because it is where you find hope. We all believe in something, even if you haven’t defined it yet.
Even if you don’t believe in a higher power, you put your faith into something. Your faith may be placed in science, your own mind, humankind, etc.
If you do believe in a higher power, I encourage you to write out what exactly you believe. How do you believe a higher power impacts your life? What support does it give you?
Getting clear on your beliefs gives you clarity on where to find hope when you need it, which is why I think it’s so important for us to explore.
Bonus Discovery: Your Ikigai
Do you want to take this one step further? Let’s get artsy and do an activity around the concept of Ikigai. Ikigai is a Japanese term for “a reason for being.” The word ‘Ikigai’ is usually refers to the source of value in one’s life or the things that make one’s life worthwhile.
This is usually figured out by completing the following chart:
Want a fast track to self-awareness? Grab your spot in my Self Discovery Toolkit to get all my tools, including yoga, breath work, and meditations. You can get 10% off your purchase by using the coupon code HUMAN.
I’d love to know – what’s one core value you know right away? Drop it down in the comments for me!
Happy discovering!
