Your Top 10 Life Skills Worth Developing…
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Written by Jimmie Burroughs 
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Personal development is a process of developing essential life skills. It is the polishing and mastering of skills that is important to your success and to reaching your potential. The following is a listing of 10 personal development life skills worth developing:
1. Develop a deep knowledge of yourself
2. Develop your mind
3. Develop Love
4. Develop fidelity
5. Develop tolerance
6. Develop a robust will
7. Develop a good Humorous character
8. Develop a healthy viewpoint on life
9. Develop a Value System
10. Develop your spiritual nature
Life skills are a required part of survival. Without them, you would be like a newly born baby who depends on others for each need. Each person has life skills potential, but skills must be developed. The development of life skills is what personal development is about.
When life skills don’t get developed, bad results can happen; For example, take #9 on the list: If there is no personal development of the value system, you have a list that includes murderers, thieves, crooks, adulterers, fornicators, and a catalogue of undesirable human beings that must be locked up and separated from the remainder of society.
To excel in a career, athletics or anything else, you have to have and develop certain skills. These include the life skills but also sometimes go outside them. For example, I developed the ability to play basketball as a youth, although it was a limited ability, not good enough to enable me to play professional basketball, but good enough to get a lot of pleasure from playing the game. Regardless of how much I practiced, I could never become good enough to be pro, but that was OK because I was not trying to become a professional basketball player. The objective of personal development is not invariably becoming the very best in the world but becoming the very best you can become.
Furthermore, by developing your life skills you are preparing yourself to better deal with the adversities and problems of life. It gives you far more control over your life as well as reinforcing your potential for success.
Finding a place to begin may be a little complicated. It is true that getting started in a continual personal development program for your life is the most difficult part, but after you get started, you will not want to stop. As you begin to see the development, you start to feel good about yourself, and you will want to be all you can become. Consider how you can start to develop the following essential life skills:
Develop a deep understanding of yourself:
Private development begins with awareness of you. You have become the foundation for developing all the other life skills. Discover what makes you tick; you are uniquely different from everyone else; what are your dreams and needs in life? What abilities do you have? “You are your own raw material. When you know precisely what you consist of and what you want to think of it, then you can invent yourself.” — Warren G. Benes.
Develop your mind:
The very foundation of personal development is acquiring information. Developing the mind is a lifelong endeavor. However, it happens just one day at a time. Information gained just a little at a time mounts over time. Just reading 10 to 15 pages of a good book on personal development every day is a great start (There is a list of 10 of the most significant books ever written on personal development on this website that are free e-Book downloads for you convenience. The tab is located on the navigational bar.) I really like also to read three or 4 chapters of the Bible every day. It has always been said, “No education is complete without knowledge of the Bible”.
Not only will developing the mind help you to become a better person; it can also help you to become an interesting and dynamic person. Developing your life skills fill a need within that no kind of money or success can. It gives fulfillment and purpose and adds an exciting new dimension of happiness.
Develop Love:
Love, like every other life skill, must be developed. Little kids love, but their love is not totally developed; therefore, they often have a tendency to be egotistic and self-centered. For some who do not mature in love that tendency continues right into adulthood.
Love simply put, is caring for others, respecting them and being concerned about them. A man or woman, who loves their mate, also respects them and would never betray them. So, since there certainly is plenty of unfaithfulness today, we can assume that there is a lot of room for developing true love.
Develop loyalty:
Loyalty is one of the most becoming traits of personal development, loyalty to your mate, your kids and your friends. Loyalty is being trusty and trustworthy, doing what you say you will do, and being loyal to your word. Loyalty never betrays another person. I saw a production lately where a woman fell in love with her best friend’s husband and stole him away and then tried to justify it. There is no justifying betrayal and disloyalty.
Develop tolerance:
We all have traits that others may not like. Tolerance is the ability to accept features in others that you do not always like or agree with. On the other hand, bigotry is expecting everybody else to do precisely as you would have him or her to do and to expect everything to be precisely as you want it to be. The exception is that no one is ever expected to be tolerant of things, which are wrong. The emphasis of tolerance is on issues of life that are not in accordance with the way we particularly look at things. They could just be a different view but sometimes could be character traits that we disagree with.
Develop a powerful will:
Developing a robust will is not the same as being unrelenting. Stubbornness is akin to prejudice, but a strong will is akin to determination. It requires a robust will to achieve success, to be the best person or be the best partner or parent. A strong will is the opposite of unsteadiness.
Develop a good Sense of humor:
Humor can carry somebody further than just about any other life skill. Everyone enjoys being around a lighthearted person who adds fun and laughter to a group setting. Some are just naturally funny, but most of us have to develop it. It is the ability to laugh at you, be at ease around others and laugh often. It is never having fun at someone else’s expense, but it is causing others to laugh as you make fun of yourself.
Develop a good point of view on life:
The dictionary defines perspective as “the capacity to view things in their true relation or relative importance.” It is looking at things from their full perspective and not in only one little area. It is easy to blow things out of perspective and dwell on the petty instead of on what actually matters. It is usually the insignificant little matters in life that lead to the most issues in wedlock or relationships. This is losing sight of what is relevant and important and letting the smaller issues control thinking and actions.
All of us experience problems and mess-ups, but how we respond to those problems and mess-ups is what distinguishes our having the right point of view. Two people can experience the very same problem: one individual lets it spoil his whole day and constantly protests while the other takes it into stride and continue on to matters that are more important. The point of view is what makes the difference; one concentrates on one insignificant event while the other looks at the entire scenario and concentrates on the most significant aspect.
Develop A Value System:
A value system is a collection of values that guide your thinking and your behavior. When you develop a solid set of values, it becomes a base for decision-making rather than dependence on impulse or gratification. Your character is defined by your value system.
Values affect every aspect of life, from your relationships, your work, the decisions you make and the life you live. It is critical to determine your values and to stand firmly on them.
Values are routinely split into four categories:
- Personal Values: Include Respect for law, authority and others; Integrity, dealing honest in all matter; Fidelity, being loyal to others or the causes in our life; Responsibility, being reliable, and accepting responsibility for all that you do.
- Spiritual Values: Recognizing a higher order of things other than just on the human plane
- Family Values : Holding your family highly and providing their needs in all areas of their life
- Career Values: Taking your work seriously and making an all out contribution.
Develop your spiritual nature:
Developing your spiritual connection with God is the most vital thing you will ever do in life. Strong spiritual beliefs are the basis of a powerful person. When there is no belief in a Devine Power, life takes on a feeling of meaninglessness, without purpose or direction. A spiritual connection with God brings all of life into perspective and gives reason to an otherwise unreasonable world. Nothing compares to what one experiences with a connection to God.
About the author: Jimmie Burroughs is a motivational speaker and author who have been involved in teaching Christian Personal Development for more than 30 years. He is a dedicated believer in Jesus Christ and considers helping others his calling in life. His website contains over 600 articles on preparing yourself for success through personal development and the things that accompany personal development.
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