The Art of progress

“Without continual growth and progress, such words as improvement, achievement, and success have no meaning.” - Benjamin Franklin

There is something to be said for continual growth and the progress and enjoyment that can come from it, it can be truly transformational, we are remarkable beings, we really can change your spots. Here are some ways we can work at "The Art of Progress".

Habits

Progress can be made over a short or long time, it can be for a specific purpose or a single one, the trick here is to start your change, stick to it and make daily progress towards it.

Make your progress a habit, really instill the habit (whatever it is) to get the results. Once you have had a few personal wins you can then trust your own process, this will lead to even more growth. Find what works for you.

Growth habit examples;

- Morning start up routine with workout, meditation

- Reading time for learning

- Journaling to reflect

- Practice Gratitude

- Courses to learn a skill or gain knowledge

Accountability

Who will hold you to account when on your own growth journey?

The answer has to be you.

You are responsible for your own growth journey, however you can be assisted. Get a trusted someone to help hold you to account and will help push you when you falter (we all do sometimes), don't hate this person for doing it, love them, it’s what you want after all. This isn’t about being aggressive it’s about being supportive, if you are someone’s support person ask questions like “have you done XYZ yet?”, “why haven’t you?”, “are you making excuses?”, I have used these questions in the past to help guide people back onto their own path and continue their personal growth journey.

Perfection

Perfection can be a killer if used in the wrong light, it can paralyze you in your pursuits of growth especially on the long journey, it can make you give up when something you try doesn't turn out the way you want, focus on the process. We are imperfect beings after all, sometimes we approach situations imperfectly or get imperfect results. Should we aim for perfection? sure, but don't let it paralyze you into fear of failure.

Failure

Failure is a hard one, who wants to fail right, however failure can sometimes be a far better teacher than success, we can learn lessons much quicker and correct with better results from failure as they give us that feedback without filter. On the other hand, our success can come from growth and hard-fought wins but it may also come around by a luckily break or through exceptional circumstance, when this happens there has been no growth or no understanding why we had the success and we could be worse off than when we started.

A quote from author Gena Showalter; "Giving up is the only sure way to fail." is a nice way to say, if we learn from a failure and keep progressing and growing have, we truly failed?

This is just the tip of the iceberg on the "The Art of Progress" and I hope you get something from it.

Enjoy Growth

Mitch