By profession, I’m a Business Analyst. In my career, I’ve worked as an employee, freelance, and also consultant in my spare time. My job greatly revolves around researching new tech in a given industry, research for locations for a new startup, marketing/product placement strategies, analytics, and automation. While doing so I have always tried my best to learn as is possible.

As our day-to-day rat race to earn our keeps continues; we heavily indulge in investing and saving for our family’s future. But most remain oblivious to the fact that with today’s technological advancements, it is vital to update and evolve through learning. In two words it’s self-development and self-growth.

Easy said than done, eh? Well, a few pointers (read like excerpts from my experience) could perhaps tempt you in the direction. Rest assured, they’re tried-tested and accepted!

1. Learn what makes you happy – there is no age to start something new. You can always start with learning something that makes you happy. If computer interests and you are good at social networking, pursuing a course or learning something related to a social media marketing or social media analytics would definitely help you connect with your interest and help you learn a new skill set that could be industry-relevant. In the meantime, I am pretty sure that every little achievement will make you smile and happy. In turn, making you even more productive.
2. Focus on learning, not just on end results – “Focus on the process, not the outcome”. Let your focus be always-on learning, once you learn, goals will seem to be simpler than opening a candy wrapper. In my personal experience, I’ve focused more on the learning I have had in my career span than the end results. On many occasions, I’ve failed to produce results that were desired, but I have ensured to learn from failures. Remember Thomas A. Edison’s, “I have not failed. I’ve just found 10,000 ways that won’t work.“ Well, that’s that.
3. Eliminate distractions – Knowledge comes from learning. Experience comes from living. A life without problems is like a school without lessons. Keep doing your thing. Problems are dime a dozen, everyone has their own set of it which easily gets them distracted. In my case, social networking sites were distracting me from learning anything new and online and hence became my problem area. One fine day I decided to deactivate my social networking site. And voila, I had more time to hone myself. I’m not saying Social Media is bad, just that it’s my distraction. Find your distraction and eliminate it at the earliest.
4. Imagine or visualize your goals – First order of business when learning, is to relate things you are learning to the things you are already doing on a daily basis. If you are learning something as simple as VBA automation, imagine how you could automate one of you report that takes a lot of time. This gives you the premise to learn how to automate your report to save time. Learning is also about implementing the learning.
5. Dedication – your dedication to your self-development plan plays a vital role. Your dedication helps you to find the right course of action to develop yourself into the next level of a whole new you loaded with skill sets and whatnot. Every step you take in the direction of learning will make you tougher and stronger. In your course of action to finish your learning, you will definitely learn that the dedication you show today to learn what you want to will help you get to the results that you will attempt to get in your career path.
6. Work hard – it goes without saying that any growth plan you may have requires an absolute amount of hard work. You could be a quick learner and grasp things very easily. If you are not, well, chances are that you will spend more time learning what you are learning. It doesn’t matter as long as you’re single-minded about your goal. But never give up on what you want. If you make it a habit to learn new things about a given topic of interest every day. Today’s hard work will bear fruits tomorrow for sure.
7. Don’t depend on someone to teach you – the Internet has grown beyond imagination. With this technological advancement, you can learn anything from anywhere in the world! There are video tutorials, blogs, forums, online training websites, etc. The possibilities are endless. You don’t have to necessarily depend upon someone to teach you something. Make up your mind and follow your calling. You’ve to start somewhere, not necessarily with someone.
8. Think Positive, be optimistic – hardships are a part and parcel of our journeys but don’t let them bog you down. Look at every problem with the optimism of finding a root cause and solution for it. Arnold Schwarzenegger, one of the most iconic bodybuilders of our time, says, “Strength does not come from winning. Your struggles develop your strengths. When you go through hardships and decide not to surrender, that is strength.”
9. No learning ever goes for waste – In my journey of learning as many things as I can, I’ve been given negative feedbacks, friendly or brotherly advice, etc. As I always, fall back to my peers, friends, and mentors for advice they’ve always asked me one thing, “What do you want to achieve in life? Or “where are you going with this?” Or “I don’t get what you’re trying to do?” My answer to these questions- I want to know everything I can learn and understand. When I’m employed by a company I would like to become indispensable in the company. Thumb rule of being in the business intelligence domain – “knowledge is power”. The more you know about things, the more you are consulted. It has been my experience as well. Not just stick to the process or project. What I’ve learned from risks in banking & insurance lets me work on contingency plans for work in retail! Like I said before, once you learn things, the possibilities are endless.
10. Bringing equilibrium in life – I am not going to paint a rosy picture of the journey you wish to take up to develop yourself. If you are reading this article that means you are looking for growth and development in your career or personal life. It really requires you to be a project manager of your own life (read: learning project management). Don’t let it just be in the back of your mind. Talk about it, implement it, and share your passion with people. Those who truly care for your growth will find you and help you.

The above 10 points are a few things that have helped me focus on my self-development and self-growth. If you have found this article while researching self-development and self-growth, I’m sure you’re on the right path. Keep up your search and always remember why you started in the first place.

Sculpture on 30th street in Boulder, Colorado, USA. There is a sculpture of a man chiseling himself out of a block of stone. The man’s head, torso, arms, and thighs have already been carved from the stone. His right-hand holds a hammer above his head ready to strike a chisel he grasps in his left hand. He is forming his right knee.