A fast-paced life and an all-consuming world of digital distractions mean that we don’t allow ourselves to stop and be in tune with our feelings, emotions, and thoughts anymore.
Self-awareness is the ability to pay attention to your feelings, characteristics, behaviors, reactions, and habits and identify your strengths and weaknesses (also called internal self-awareness). It can be defined as the ability to tune into your own feelings, thoughts, and actions. And as a result, it allows you to see and understand yourself objectively through self-reflection and introspection.
But self-awareness is not just about you. Indeed, being self-aware is also about acknowledging that what you say and how you act can affect others around you. By recognizing this, you’ll be able to understand how other people perceive you (also called external self-awareness) and adjust your behavior accordingly.
Two Main Types of Self-Awareness
Private self-awareness
This type can also be called introspective self-awareness. It refers to noticing and reflecting on the internal state. This type of self-awareness allows you to reflect on thoughts and emotions, which can lead to a better understanding of yourself and others.
Public self-awareness
One more type emerges when people are aware of how they appear to others, also called interoceptive self-awareness. This type of self-understanding helps you to understand others' physical sensations and respond appropriately.
How to Know If You are a Self-Aware Person
We’ve covered what self-awareness is, and importance of self-awareness. Now, how are you supposed to find out how self-aware you are.
You may simply take the quiz! The iNLP Center has 12 multiple-choice questions that will tell your level of self-awareness. The assessment is research-based and developed by Mike Bundrant, a neuro-linguistic trainer and life coach.
One more useful tool for you to evaluate and understand how balanced your life is in different aspects, adjust, and lead a successful and happy life is the Life Balance Wheel. The method identifies key areas that are important to you as a person, and that will help you assess your current life as well as the life you’d like to create in the future.
How to Become More Self-Aware
There are a few different ways to increase your level of self-awareness. If you’re intrigued, keep reading!
Explore the Truth about Yourself
This step is critical as the person who is the most likely to lie to you is, in fact, you!
Indeed, our complex minds have an ego defense mechanism designed to keep us physically and emotionally safe. As a result, if you get evidence that you’re behaving in a way that doesn’t suit your self-image, and you don’t like the story it creates about you, your mind will tend to discount the evidence.
It’s a way to protect you from your fears and the pain you’ll probably experience if you end this relationship. However, to improve your self-awareness, instead of suppressing your feelings and emotions, you need to be willing to acknowledge them to learn more about yourself and grow.
Ask for Feedback
Let’s be honest, asking for feedback can be daunting, and as a result, it is not something most of us happily do. Yet, asking for constructive feedback is one of the best ways to improve your self-awareness, learn more about yourself and grow as an individual. After all, others can usually see you far more objectively than you see ourselves. Not only do they see things you don’t see about yourself (blind spots), but they can also reaffirm or contradict how you perceive yourself.
Journal
Journaling is a powerful tool to improve your self-awareness.
Indeed, when journaling and writing about your day, or your week, and how you’ve been feeling about what has been happening in your life, you tend to engage with your inner-self. You’re able to take the time to connect with yourself and write down your feelings and your emotions. The massive benefit of journaling is that you’re usually not writing in the moment, which means you’re more objective at the time of writing. This can, in turn, help you better understand your feelings, reactions, and thoughts.