Becoming the Best Version of Yourself
Becoming the Best Version of Yourself
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Everyone wants to become the best version of themselves, but few actually do it. Either we become self-destructive without realizing it, or we are conscious of this fact but lack the tools and/or knowledge in order to improve. While there is no single formula or ‘golden method’ when it comes to creating the best version of ourselves, there is the same starting point for all of us, and that's within ourselves.
Overview
Becoming the best version of yourself breaks down into six steps:
Think big and focus on hope;
Believe in yourself;
Set goals;
Make good use of your time;
Accept new challenges;
Take time to identify your strengths.
Let’s dive in!
1.) Think big and focus on hope
Great minds have very big ideas. The thoughts that run through our head have a big impact on how we see ourselves.
Most of us struggle with a critical balancing act, one between hope and fear.
Hope is a strength. The foundation for any relationship or belief falls on the foundation of hope. That relationship can be with a dream that we have, our goals, or our ambitions.
Hope gives us a reason to believe in the impossible, a reason to believe in something bigger than ourselves.
There still lingers this idea that having a big dream or big ambitions is unrealistic, but here’s why this thinking is so dangerous: when we set the bar low for ourselves, we are merely stretching our safety net. And by doing so, we fail to allow ourselves to learn.
We fail to put ourselves through the gauntlet of growth. We need to recognize the delta of knowledge between just lightly stretching our capabilities versus feeling the discomfort of growth.
Discomfort breads growth. Extending ourselves into that 'discomfort zone’ increases our opportunity to grow by greater leaps and bounds.
Fear is that doubtful little voice that tells us we “can't”. It’s an emotional reaction to an unwelcome experience. When we train our minds to understand the powers of acceptance and struggle, and what they help us accomplish, we can then let go of this fear.
And when we allow hope to override fear, we meet opportunity.
Hope suffocates fear every time.
2.) Believe in yourself
We need to believe in ourselves, because what we want to do for ourselves, our lives, our careers, and our dreams may far exceed what others want, where they are now, or where they want to go.
This means we face unknown territory. We need to be our own biggest fan, our own light.
Life can be challenging — as it should be. It builds us up for the next wave, to excel to a greater level tomorrow. When opportunity pokes its face around the corner, we need to seize that moment, because we never know when it’s going to come back around.
In order to seize those moments, we need to be on our toes mentally. We need to believe that we can do that particular thing.
Our value is directly linked to our beliefs. If we believe that we can do something, it will become a reality. We need to believe that we are able to accomplish anything, because even a shred of doubt will create a big wedge between us and our dreams.
We can’t figure out what we’re worth unless we know what we’re capable of doing. Our potential is intangible, and a majority of that potential comes down to our mindset.
If we are disciplined, we are capable of accomplishing anything. But if we ignore our potential, it will significantly reduce our value.
It’s not where we are right now, but where we’re heading that determines our value. If we're not interrupting our mind with thoughts of doubt, we will achieve greatness, and our thinking needs to be in-line with this.
Think about it like this:
You can't successfully pitch a room of investors if you doubt yourself.
You can't come off confident on a date if you don't love yourself first.
You can't run a company if you think you're incapable.
It starts with you, and with trusting yourself. It starts with understanding that you can, no matter what the odds look like.
This mindset is what paves the road to our future self.
3.) Set goals
If we don’t know where we are going, it’s very easy to lose our way. A clear plan outlines each time-bound step we need to take to reach our goals.
So, how can we set these clear goals and plans?
We need to be clear and specific with what we want to achieve. We can’t just say that we want to “get fit” or “healthy”. We need to be specific, and we need to make it a clear goal that we can measure:
“I want to run a mile in six minutes”.
“I want to lose twelve pounds”.
We need to break the goal down into steps. This allows us to set smaller goals that we can reach throughout the year and reward ourselves with something when we reach them.
We need to track our progress. When we do this, and can visually see our progress, we feel good about ourselves. We see our improvements and feel continued motivation to keep pushing.
A little bonus: create a mantra to keep yourself focused. Our minds are full of noise — largely repetitive, useless thoughts that are on replay much of the time. A mantra can slice through those thoughts in any moment, especially when you craft one that is meaningful just to you.
Successful people use this technique to stay on track, emotionally connect to their mission, and establish a clear finish line.
4.) Make good use of your time
We need to ensure that we’re not wasting our time on frivolous activities.
Time is a depreciating asset, unlike other things in our lives that can be purchased, collected, or hoarded. Time falls outside of all of those categories — it depreciates day by day.
Even though all of us know this, most of us still choose to use our time poorly. How can we start to use our time wisely, then?
First off, start tomorrow, today. This serves two purposes:
It allows us to pull things out of our mind and get them down on either a piece of paper or an app, which can help us fall asleep with a clear mind. That way we’re getting proper rest to attack tomorrow and give our energy to the things that matter.
It allows us to have a clear vision, intentions, and goals for the following day.
Secondly, automate and delegate. We don't have to do everything ourselves — we need to leverage automation, if possible, or learn to delegate tasks appropriately. Technology has now gotten to the point where we can automate a number of things in our life, such as:
Making appointments.
Scheduling.
Auto-shipping items.
Using Google docs and sheets or Apple files to link documents and devices.
Setting reminders on smart devices or our phones.
Paying bills.
There are a number of options and resources.
Next, identify your most productive times. By identifying these productive time periods, we are able to ensure that we assign and complete our most important and difficult tasks in those periods with minimal interruptions. These important tasks consume greater time if there are interruptions, so assigning them to our productive time slots ensures the greatest efficiency.
You may be wondering, “How do I identify my most productive times?”.
One way is by simply understanding when you feel like you're doing your best work. If that doesn't help, over the course of a week or two, jot down any moments that you feel like you're on a roll, and note the time. Over the course of that week or two, try to identify if there’s a pattern, a specific block of time between those days or weeks where you are most productive.
Lastly, identify your time-wasters. Write down the moments where you shift gears and break from deep work. Note where and how it happened.
When we spend the time analyzing these patterns, we can build future workarounds to prevent them.
5.) Accept new challenges
Opportunities can be found in all challenges. We need to learn to embrace challenges and difficult times because they create the ultimate strength.
Struggling is a clear indicator that we are in “growth-mode”.
We face struggles because they are new challenges that we have never faced before, and because we’ve lacked that exposure. But, that does not indicate weakness. It does not mean that we are incapable or that we are not worthy.
It means that we are facing walls we’ve never climbed before, and finding those foot holes while holding ourselves upright makes our muscles twitch a bit.
To struggle is to grow. This is the weight of life that allows us to lift heavier loads. It allows us to be wiser about how we lift those weights.
When we quit, that’s when we lose.
When we start to tell ourselves that we can no longer push, we are telling ourselves that we are not capable, that we are not worthy.
Here’s why this is so dangerous: not only do we lose faith in ourselves during that moment, we lose faith in ourselves the next time we face a challenge. At the back of our mind sits doubt — if we struggled before, and tossed in the towel, what will this time look like?
Surrendering means giving in to a lot more than just that particular challenge. And I want to be clear: there is a difference between surrendering to the moment, like accepting a position we are in currently, and accepting reality.
The latter type of surrendering is connected to acceptance, whereas surrendering and throwing our hands up in defeat is a physical and mental way of saying, “I can no longer do this. I’m incapable of doing this”. Which is not accurate.
We are capable of doing so much more than we think, but in order to realize that we need to be willing to climb those tall walls. We need to be willing to make ourselves struggle.
Never be afraid of failure to the point where you refuse to take on new challenges. This is the sweet spot of growth.
6.) Take time to identify your strengths
To become our best self, we must identify and utilize our strengths, because when we identify what our strengths are, we can use them to our advantage as we work toward self-improvement.
And despite what you might think about yourself, we are all good at something. The challenge that most struggle with is when they don’t immediately see the things that they're good at. They start to second guess themselves and wonder if they're good at anything at all.
If you’re struggling to identify your strengths, ask yourself these questions:
“What do people tell me I’m good at?”.
“What do I receive compliments about?”.
“What skill or talent comes so naturally to me that I don’t even have to think about it, but other people struggle with it?”.
“If someone asked me what I’m good at, how would I answer?”.
And then there’s the flipside to that coin — things that we’re not so good at.
In all honesty, everyone is bad at something. We can’t all be good at everything. If we can admit what we’re bad at, then we can either start to work on it, or delegate it to someone else.
Both our strengths and our weaknesses/areas of improvement are equally important to identify. So, ask yourself:
“What would happen if I focused on what I did best in life, instead of constantly adding to the list of skills and techniques that I felt I had to learn before I can become a success?”.
By examining this question, we can start to work towards a better version of ourselves.
Conclusion
There you have it — six steps to becoming the best version of yourself. I hope the examples and definitions in this guide help you achieve clarity in understanding and working toward what the best version of yourself looks like.
I’d love to hear from you:
What does the best version of yourself look like?
Do you feel you are, or are on track to be, the best version of yourself right now?
Have a wonderful week, all.
Much love to you and yours, Scott (@motivatedscott). ❤️
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