Personal Growth Leads to Living Well
There is nothing so important in our lives as seeking out and pursuing opportunities to grow as a person. Like any other living creature, our purpose in life is to contribute and move toward becoming our best selves continually. Just as plants are born and start to grow throughout their lives.
Look at your life and each activity you participate in, asking yourself about the growth potential. We are all consciously, physically, and mentally going one of two ways.
- We are getting better or becoming more or growing. 2. We are getting worse, becoming less or shrinking.
Nobody is staying the same. Our actions that stem from our decisions each day are the forces that determine our direction.
Personal Growth Through Pain
Sometimes growth stems out of pain. We often
wonder why painful events happen in our lives. Yet, these events often move you to strike out in a new direction rather than stay where you are. The pain can provide motivation and momentum to us to find new avenues for our talents or roads to travel, which we would never have conceived of before. Our shell is broken, and a new life of growth will result.
With those we love, we try to shield them from the painful things in life. Our children, especially, under the guise of protecting them, are potentially robbing them of some of the most potent growth experiences. Being with them at painful times allows them to feel and provide empathetic support and sharing in their suffering, realizing that there is a time in life that pain happens, and all we can do is reassure them that healing comes. Eventually, it does come if you let it.
Life-Long Education= Personal Growth
Growth can also occur through production by taking action. An interest will present itself, and through the natural forces of inquiry, a person will pursue their interest to find out more. The student learns throughout their education and training to master their craft.
The problem is there is a lot of life left after your formal education is completed. Learning needs to be a lifelong pursuit that will continually keep you on a path of growth. Most often, this is an individually motivated choice of practice. If you don’t look for ways to improve yourself, learn something new, or develop your mind and body, the alternative is to move backward slowly. Today we have access to a world of education and can learn how to do anything at all. We only need an internet connection to learn about anything from anatomy to rocket science.
Growth is NOT Difficult
It is not difficult to grow in your mind or in the talents you possess. Like anything ever in life, it involves taking an interest, developing an intent, and taking action 
toward completing a goal or developing a skill. The passion that a person has toward achieving that goal will determine how severe the task will ultimately be.
Looking for opportunities to grow daily is vitally important. You are never too old, too weak, too significant, too small, or too anything else to find avenues for personal growth. Reading something of substance each day is an excellent way to start. Each new idea or thought you experience will allow your mind to expand and think better and more efficiently. Once a consciousness expands, it takes a lot of neglect to move it in the opposite direction. Choose to grow!
“Every moment of one’s existence, one is growing into more or retreating into less.” ―Norman Mailer.
“Income seldom exceeds personal development.” ―Jim Rohn.
“You cannot dream yourself into a character; you must hammer and forge yourself one.” ―Henry David Thoreau.
“Life is growth. If we stop growing, technically and spiritually, we are as good as dead.” ―Morihei Ueshiba
