42 Practical Ways To Improve Yourself Are you someone who likes to grow?

Do you constantly seek to improve yourself an d become better? If you do, then we have something in common. I m very passionate about personal gr owth. It was just 4 years ago when I discovered my passion for growing and helpi ng others grow. At that time, I was 22 and in my final yearof university. As I t hought about the meaning of life, I realized there was nothing more meaningful t han to pursue a life of development and betterment. It is through improving ours elves that we get the most out of life. After 1.5 years of actively pursuing growth and helping others to grow through m y personal development blog, I realize there is never an end to the journey of s elf improvement. The more I grow, the more I realize there is so much out there I don t know, so much that I have to learn . For sure, there is always something a bout ourselves we can improve on. The human potential is limitless, so it s imposs ible to reach a point of no growth. Whenever we think we are good, we can be eve n better. As a passionate advocate of growth, I m continuously looking for ways to self-impr ove. I ve compiled 42 of my best tips which might be helpful in yourpersonal growt h journey. Some of them are simple steps which you can engage in immediately. So me are bigger steps which takes conscious effort to act on. Here they are: 1. Read a book every day. Books are concentrated sources of wisdom. The more boo ks you read, the more wisdom you expose yourself to. What are some books you can start reading to enrich yourself? Some books I ve read and found useful are Think and Grow Rich, Who Moved MyCheese, 7 Habits, The Science of Getting Rich and Li ving the 80/20 Way. I ve heard positive reviews for The Tipping Point, Outliers an d The Difference Maker, so I ll be checking them out soon. 2. Learn a new language . As a Singaporean Chinese, my main languages are Englis h, Mandarin and Hokkien (a Chinese dialect). Out of interest, I took up language courses in the past few years such as Japanese and Bahasa Indonesian. I realize d learning a language is a wholenew skill altogether and the process of acquaint ing with a new language and culture is a totally a mind-opening experience. 3. Pick up a new hobby . Beyond just your usual favorite hobbies, is there somet hing new you can pick up? Anynew sport you can learn? Examples are fencing, golf , rock climbing, football, canoeing, or ice skating. Your new hobby can also be a recreational hobby. For example, pottery, Italian cooking, dancing, wine appre ciation, web design, etc. Learning something new requires youto stretch yoursel f in different aspects, whether physically, mentally or emotionally. 4. Take up a new course . Is there any new course you can join? Courses area gre at way to gain new knowledge and skills. It doesn t have to be a long-term course seminars or workshops serve their purpose too. I ve been to a few workshops and th ey have helped me gain new insights which I had not considered before. 5. Create an inspirational room . Your environment sets the mood and tonefor you . If you are living in an inspirational environment, you are going to be inspire d every day. In the past, I didn t like my room at all because I thought it was me ssy and dull. A few years ago, I decided this was the end of it I started on a Me ga Room Revamp project and overhauled my room. The end result?A room I totally re lish being in and inspires me to be at my peak every day. 6. Overcome your fears . All of us have fears. Fear of uncertainty, fear of publ ic speaking, fear of risk All our fears keep us in the same position and prevent us from growing. Recognize that your fears reflect areas where you can grow. I always think of fears as the compass for growth. If I have a fear about somethin g, it represents something I ve yet to address, and addressing it helps me to grow . 7. Level up your skills. If you have played video games before especially RPGs, you ll know the concept of leveling up gaining experience so you can be better and stronger. As ablogger, I m constantly leveling up my writing skills. As a speaker , I m constantly leveling up my public engagement abilities. What skills can you l evel up? 8. Wake up early . Waking up early (say,5-6am) has been acknowledged by many (An

thony Robbins, Robin Sharma, among other self-help gurus)to improve your product ivity and yourquality of life. I feel it s because when you wake up early, your mi ndset is already set to continue the momentum and proactively live out the day. Seth recently wrote a waking up early series which you should check out to help cultivate this habit. 9. Have a weekly exercise routine . A better you starts with being in betterphys ical shape. I personally make it a point to jog at least 3 times a week, at leas t 30 minutes each time. You may want to mix it up with jogging, gym lessons and swimming for variation. 10. Start your life handbook . A life handbook is an idea I started 3 years ago. Basically, it s a book which contains the essentials on how you can live your lif e to the fullest, such as your purpose, your values and goals. Sort of like your manual for your life. I started my lifehandbook since 2007 and it s been a crucia l enabler in my progress. 11. Write a letter to your future self . What do you see yourself as 5 yearsfrom now? Will you be the same? Different? What kind of person will you be? Write a letter to your future self 1 year from now will bea good start and seal it. Mak e a date in your calendar to open it 1 year from now. Then start working to beco me the person you want to open that letter. 12. Get out of your comfort zone. Real growth comes with hard work and sweat. Be ing too comfortable doesn t help us grow it makes us stagnate. What is your comfor t zone? Do you stay in most of the time? Do you keep to your own space when out with other people?Shake your routine up. Do something different. By exposing you rself to a new context, you re literally growing as you learn to act in new circum stances. 13. Put someone up to a challenge . Competition is one of the best waysto grow. Set a challenge (weight loss, exercise, financial challenge, etc) and compete wi th an interested friend to see who achieves the target first. Through the proces s, both of you will gain more than if you were to set off onthe target alone. 14. Identify your blind spots . Scientifically, blind spots refer to areas our e yes are not capable of seeing. In personal development terms, blind spots are th ings about ourselves we are unaware of. Discovering our blind spots help us disc over our areas of improvement. One exercise I use to discover my blind spots is to identify all the things/events/people that trigger me in a day trigger meanin g making me feel annoyed/weird/affected. These represent my blindspots. It s alway s fun to do the exercise because I discover new things about myself, even if I m ay already think I know my own blind spots (but then they wouldn t be blind spots would they?). After that, I work on steps to address them. 15. Ask for feedback. As much as we try to improve, we will always have blind sp ots. Asking for feedback gives us an additional perspective. Some people to appr oach will be friends, family, colleagues, boss, or even acquaintances, since the y will have no preset bias and can give their feedback objectively. 16. Stay focused with to-do lists . I startmy day with a list of tasks I want to complete and this helps make me stay focused. In comparison, the days when I don t do this end up being extremely unproductive. For example, part of my to-do list for today is to write a guest post at LifeHack.Org, and this is why I m writing t his now! Since my work requires me to use my computer all the time, I use Free S ticky Notes to manage my to-do lists. It s really simple to use and it s a freeware, soI recommend you check it out. 17. Set Big Hairy Audacious Goals (BHAGs) . I m a big fan of setting BHAGs. BHAGs stretch you beyond your normal capacity since they are big and audacious you wou ldn t think of attempting them normally. What are BHAGs you can embark on, which y ou ll feel absolutely on top of the world once you complete them? Set them and sta rtworking on them. 18. Acknowledge your flaws . Everyone has flaws. What s most important is to under stand them, acknowledge them, and address them. What do you think are your flaws ? What are the flaws you can work on now? How do you want to address them? 19. Get into action. The best way to learn and improve is to take action. What i s something you have been meaning to do? How can you take action on it immediate ly? Waiting doesn t get anything done. Taking action gives you immediate results t

o learn from. 20. Learn from people who inspire you. Think about people you admire. People who inspire you. These people reflect certain qualities you want to have for yourse lf too. Whatare the qualities in them you want to have for yourself? How can you acquire these qualities? 21. Quit a bad habit. Are there any bad habits you can lose? Oversleeping? Not e xercising? Being late? Slouching? Nail biting? Smoking? Here s some help on how yo u can quit a bad habit . 22. Cultivate a new habit . Some good new habits to cultivate include reading bo oks (#1), waking up early(#8), exercising (#9), reading a new personal developme nt article a day (#40) and meditating. Is there any other new habit you can cult ivate to improve yourself? 23. Avoid negative people . As Jim Rohnsays, You are the average of the 5people y ou spend the most time with . Wherever we go, there are bound to be negative peopl e. Don tspend too much of your time around them if you feel they drag you down. 24. Learn to deal with difficult people . There are times when there are difficu lt people you can t avoid, suchas at your workplace, or when the person is part of your inner circle of contacts. Learn how to deal with them. These people manage ment skills will go a long way in working with people in the future. 25. Learn from your friends . Everyone has amazing qualities in them. It s up to h ow we want to tap into them. With all the friends who surround you, they are goi ng to have things you can learn from. Try thinking of a good friend right now. T hink about just one quality they have which you want to adopt. How can you learn from them and adopt this skill for yourself? Speak tothem if you need to for su re, they will be more than happy to help! 26. Start a journal . Journaling is a great way to gain better self-awareness. I t s a self-reflection process. As you write, clarify your thought process and read what you wrote from a third person s perspective, you gain more insights about yo urself. Your journal can be private or an online blog. I use my personal develop ment blog as a personal journal too and I ve learned a lot about myself through th e past year of blogging. 27. Start a blog about personal development . To help others grow,you need to fi rst be walking the talk. There are expectations of you,both from yourself and fr om others,which you have to uphold. I run The Personal Excellence Blog, where I share my personal journey and insights on how to live a better life. Readers loo k toward my articles to improve themselves, which enforces to me that I need to keepimproving, for myself and for the people I m reaching out to. 28. Get a mentor or coach. There s no faster way to improve than to have someone w ork with you on your goals. Many of my clients approach me to coach them in thei r goals andthey achieve significantly more results than if they had worked alone . 29. Reduce the time you spend on chatprograms. I realized having chat programs o pen at default result in a lot of wasted time. This time can bemuch better spent on other activities. The days when I don t get on chat, I get a lot more done. I usually disable the auto start-up option in the chat programs and launch them wh en I do want to chat and really have the time for it. 30. Learn chess (or any strategy game). I found chess is a terrific game to lear n strategy and hone your brainpower. Not only do you have fun, you also get to e xercise your analytical skills. You can also learn strategy from other board gam es orcomputer games, such as Othello, Chinese Chess, WarCraft, and so on. 31. Stop watching TV . I ve not been watching TV for pretty much 4 years and it s be en a very liberating experience. I realized most of the programs and advertiseme nts on mainstream TV are usually of a lower consciousness and not very empowerin g. In return, the time I ve freed up from not watching TVis now constructively use d for otherpurposes, such as connecting with close friends, doing work I enjoy, exercising, etc. 32. Start a 30-day challenge . Set a goaland give yourself 30 days to achievethi s. Your goal can be to stick with a new habit or something you ve always wanted to do but have not. 30 days is just enough time to strategize, plan, get into acti on, review and nail the goal.

33. Meditate . Meditation helps to calm you and be more conscious. I also realiz ed that during the nights whenI meditate (before I sleep), I need lesser sleep. The clutter clearing process is very liberating. 34. Join Toastmasters (Learn public speaking). Interestingly, public speaking is the #1 fear in the world,with #2 being death. After I started public speaking a s a personaldevelopment speaker/trainer, I ve learned a lot about how to communica te better, present myselfand engage people. Toastmasters isan international orga nization that trains people in public speaking. Check out the Toastmaster clubs nearest to you here. 35. Befriend top people in their fields . These people have achieved their resul ts because they have the right attitudes, skill sets and know-how. How better to learn than from the people who have been there and done that? Gain new insights from them on how you can improve and achieve the same results for yourself. 36. Let go of the past . Is there any grievance or unhappiness from the past whi ch you have been holding on? If so, it s time to let it go. Holding on to them pre vents you from moving on and becoming a better person. Break away from thepast, forgive yourself, and move on.Just recently, I finally moved on from a past hear tbreak of 5 years ago. The effect was liberating and very empowering, and I have never been happier. 37. Start a business venture . Is there anything you have an interest in? Why no t turn it into a venture and make money while learning at the same time? Startin g a new venture requires you to be learn business management skills, develop bus inessacumen and have a competitive edge. The process of starting and developing my personal development business has equippedme with many skills, such as self-d iscipline, leadership, organization and management. 38. Show kindness to people around you . You can never be too kind to someone. I n fact, most of us don t show enough kindness to people around us. Being kind help s us to cultivate other qualities such as compassion, patience, and love. As you get back to your day after reading this article later on, start exuding more ki ndness to the people around you, and see how they react. Not only that, notice h ow you feel as you behave kindly to others. Chances are, you will feeleven bette r than yourself. 39. Reach out to the people who hate you . If you ever stand for something, you are going to get haters. It s easy to hate the people who hate us. It s much more ch allenging to love them back. Being able to forgive, let go and show love to thes e people requires magnanimity and an open heart. Is there anyone who dislikes or hates you in your life? If so, reach out to them. Show them love. Seek a resolu tion and get closure on past grievances. Even if they refuses to reciprocate, lo ve them all the same.It s much more liberating than to hate them back. 40. Take a break . Have you been working too hard? Self-improvementis also about recognizing our need to take a break to walk the longer mile ahead. You can t be driving a car if it has no petrol. Take some time off for yourself every week. R elax, rejuvenate and charge yourself up for what s up ahead. 41. Read at least 1 personal development article a day . Some ofmy readers make it a point to read at least one personal development article every day, which I think is a great habit. There are many terrific personal development blogs out t here, some of which you can checkhere . 42. Commit to your personal growth . I can be writing list articles with 10 ways , 25 ways, 42 ways or even 1,000 ways to improve yourself, butif you ve no intenti on to commit to your personal growth, it doesn t matter what I write. Nothing is g oing to get through. We are responsible for our personal growth not anyone else. Not your mom, your dad, your friend, me or LifeHack. Make the decision to commi t to your personal growth and embrace yourself to a life-long journey of growth and change. Kickoff your growth by picking a few of the steps above and working on them. The results may not be immediate, but I promise you that as long as you keep to it, you ll startseeing positive changes in yourself and your life.