Monday 8 December 2008

Practical steps to personal growth

Those of us who are serious about personal growth must plan to do it. If you are like me getting side-tracked is one of the easiest things to do as we live such busy. We need to plan time in our calender that works for us and then seek to guard that time like any other appointment.

I remember reading somewhere that teachers report that people learn more effectively in short regular periods than in long, infrequent blocks of time.

John Maxwell shares his weekly development plan that I have tried to adopt (I am not always successful, but it is good to aim at something rather than do nothing!)

  • Monday: One hour with God
  • Tuesday: One hour listening to a leadership CD/Podcast etc
  • Wednesday: One hour with the same leadership CD/Podcast incuding time filing notes on the highlights and reflecting on what is learned.
  • Thursday: One hour reading a leadership book
  • Friday: Another hour with the same leadership book, including time filing notes on the highlights and reflecting on what is learned.

This is a challenging plan but I recommend you have a shot! In addition to this go through other good materials whilst traveling or sitting around. Time that some would consider dead time and use it wisely. Cut out articles, quotes, artworks etc that may be useful.

More to follow .....

2 comments:

Raymond E. Foster said...

As trite as it sounds, long journeys begin with a single step. I agree, breaking any task, like personal development in a particular area, into small steps is the only way to accomplish it. I see you have devoted one hour a day - me, 15 minutes on whatever I am working on. I can always find that 15 minutes; that gives you well over 70 hours a year:)

Mark Sherratt said...

Thanks for your comments. 70 hours a year - Brilliant! It is amazing how a relatively small amount of time adds up to so much. Bless you sir and keep on going for it and encourage others to do the same.