SELF AWARENESS

“Your visions will become clear only when you can look into your own heart. Who looks outside, dreams; who looks inside, awakes.”
― C.G. Jung

Self-awareness is "an awareness of one's own personality or individuality". It is not to be confused with consciousness in the sense of qualia. While consciousness is being aware of one's environment and body and lifestyle, self-awareness is the recognition of that awareness.

Self-awareness is how an individual consciously knows and understands their own character, feelings, motives, and desires. There are two broad categories of self-awareness: internal self-awareness and external self-awareness.

How Self-Awareness Makes You More Effective

Skill development.

Improvement projects should normally begin with an assessment of the gap between the current situation and the desired future situation. Having an accurate sense of who you are helps you decide what you should do to improve. Often, self-awareness will reveal a skills gap that you want to work on.

Knowing your strengths and weaknesses.

Self-awareness helps you exploit your strengths and cope with your weaknesses. For instance, if you are someone who is good at "seeing the big picture" that surrounds decisions, but not as good at focusing on the details, you might want to consult colleagues and subordinates that are more detail-oriented when making major decisions. Cooperation between big-picture-oriented decision makers and detail-oriented decision makers can produce high quality decisions.

Developing intuitive decision-making skills.

Leaders with well-developed emotional self-awareness are more effective intuitive decision makers. In complex situations, intuitive decision makers process large amounts of sometimes unstructured and ambiguous data, and they choose a course of action based on a "gut feeling" or a "sense" of what's best. This type of decision making is becoming more important for managers as the rate of change and the levels of uncertainty and complexity in their competitive environments increase. Managers who are highly emotionally self-aware are better able to read their "gut feelings" and use them to guide decisions.

Motivation.

It's very difficult to cope with poor results when you don't understand what causes them. When you don't know what behaviors to change to improve your performance, you just feel helpless. Self-awareness is empowering because it can reveal where the performance problems are and indicate what can be done to improve performance. In addition, awareness of your psychological needs can increase your motivation by helping you understand and seek out the rewards that you really desire such as a sense of accomplishment, additional responsibility, an opportunity to help others, or a flexible work schedule.

Tips for being more self-aware: -

Some techniques that can help you, become more self-aware include:

Journaling, where one reflects on one’s experiences by writing about them outside the therapy session. Such insights can make therapy more effective.
Therapy, including self-help books, especially those recommended by one’s therapist because they are particularly insightful and based on sound research.
Art therapies and sand trays, where one creates images or arranges figures and objects that bring the playful imagination of childhood into greater awareness for self-discovery and healing.
Mindfulness-based stress reduction (MBSR), which helps people manage physical and emotional pain.
Meditation classes, especially those teaching mindfulness meditation.
Group therapies, where one’s self-awareness is enhanced by feedback from others and by hearing others’ similar experiences. One’s social interactions are also observed “live,” so the therapist and group can address them.

3 Ways to Improve Your Self-Awareness with Yoga:

1. Find Presence Where You’re Standing

Staying conscious of your foundation assures a strong place to build your poses. Whenever you land in a pose, be sure to keep awareness in your hands and feet or whatever is keeping you connected with the ground.

2. Check-In with the Now

There’s always something to be done. Living in the future keeps our mental wheels spinning so fast that being present becomes a practical skill. Checking in with yourself in the present moment requires a consciousness of your current state of affairs.

3. Notice the In-Between Moments

Sometimes the most information can be found in the transitions between poses. Maybe you’ve become confident being in a posture, but getting into and out of the posture is akin to a baby giraffe learning to walk.

Essential Oils Therapy to Improve Self-Awareness

Frankincense
Lavender
Chamomile
Lemon Oil
Rose

Meditation

Chakras, body scan, breathing, sensory and deep meditation

Meditation