Inform Yourself

In my previous post I presented you a process for becoming more self aware. Additionally, I also revealed the key relationship between self awareness and success. The part tying the two together is self management.

While self awareness is a key piece of the foundation for success, self management is the process by which you utilize your self-awareness in achieving greater success either personally or professionally.
So how do you utilize your self-awareness to achieve your success? The following process provides you the keys to utilizing your self-awareness in self-management.

The first step is to recognize what emotions you are experiencing in the current situation. Also, recognize the emotions that others are displaying in the current situation. These emotions have the potential to get in the way of your most important personal and business decisions.

The second step is to be empathetic towards the emotions you and those you are interacting with in a given situation are exhibiting. Being empathetic doesn’t necessarily mean you agree with them however it does mean that you recognize and accept their emotions. Emotions are not right or wrong, good or bad, they are merely emotions. The key here is to recognize the emotions being exhibited. In doing so you give yourself and those with who you are engaged significance. Significance is one of the core emotions everyone seeks in every moment.

The third step is to determine if the emotions being exhibited by all is more or less useful in reaching a decision on a course of action to take. Focus on your emotions first. Other will feed off of the emotions you are outwardly exhibiting about the situation and those involved. Ask yourself, are my emotions hindering me in anyway? If they are, what must you do to change your emotions? Are they the most useful emotions in order for me to make an informed decision right now? It not, what emotions would be more useful?

The fourth step is to take action in changing your emotions to those that would be more useful for the given situation. This is your conscious decision to be more effective in the moment. Change how you feel about the situation to those emotions you identified as being more useful in step three.

The fifth step is to decide on the source of action to take for the given situation. Ask yourself the following:
What is the core issue?
What are my options?
What is my best option?

The sixth step is to acknowledge the emotions of others and then presenting your decision on the course of action you will take. This accomplishes two things. First it again gives those involved significance. They do matter! Secondly, it gives them certainty on how you and they are going to move forward. Certainty is the other core emotion everyone seeks at every moment.

When you utilize the process above you will demonstrate good self management. This is born out of your heightened self awareness. Additionally, it will enable you to interact more effectively with others and make more sound decisions.