We’ve discussed the first five steps in building your character – reflection, moving out of your comfort zone, practicing new characteristics, seeking feedback, and finding a coach. Here are the last steps you’ll need to build character.
Keep a Learning-and-Progress Journal
Writing down what you are feeling and learning during your change effort will reinforce what you have learned, and it will help your new behavior stick. It is a great measurement tool. In your journal, you can record your progress against your goals.
A journal is another way to hold yourself accountable to your new standards.
From time to time go back and read your previous journal entries. It will help you see your progress. You will get a sense of whether you are winning or getting behind.
It is good to involve emotion in change. Write down your feelings regarding the challenges and the joys you are experiencing. It will increase your level of commitment. It will build your passion for changing.
A journal is a good place to keep pictures, graphics, and other representations of what you are trying to achieve. It is also a good place to keep your scorecards, where you measure your progress. Graph your progress. It will help you to visualize the victory.
Writing about your character will build your character.
Study Great People
Seek to expose yourself to new and better characteristics. Open yourself to the wisdom of great people. Great people have great characteristics. They have utilized principles to help achieve greatness.
Study the lives of such people. Read their biographies and histories. Watch biography videos. The goal is to learn the characteristics that make them great. Make a list of those characteristics. Choose from the list those that you want to include in your life.
Yes, you can become like them!
If you study greatness, you too can become great!
Use the Power of Discipline
Become physically disciplined. Learn a new sport, climb tall mountains, run a marathon. Do something physical that requires you to grow and to use discipline. Do things that challenge you physically.
Increase your mental discipline: Study regularly, learn new ideas, or learn to play a musical instrument. Engage in lively conversations with people. Expand the capacity of your mind.
Discipline yourself to set goals and achieve them. Become loyal to that which is most important to you, and achieve it with discipline.
The discipline you learn in the physical and mental areas of your life will spill over into everything that you do. Build discipline.
Use the principle of service to enlarge your soul and to warm your heart. Love others more than yourself. The discipline of regularly giving your time as well as your money to others will build your character.
Building discipline builds character!
Train and Practice
Create the habit of training and practicing every single day—something that you do every day without fail, either physical or spiritual, that brightens, heightens, and enlightens your awareness and develops you as a human being. The Japanese call this Do. The Chinese call it Dao or The Way.
Remember, perfect practice makes perfect. Your practice is The Way you mindfully pursue.
Having a practice is a necessary requirement of character.
Mark Victor Hansen, best known as the co-creator of the ‘Chicken Soup for the Soul’ empire (which is listed in the Guinness Book of World Records as the best-selling non-fiction book series ever), is a walking success magnet! Between his books and speeches, Mark has helped countless millions of people become their very best. Visit Mark’s 101 E-Book Library at www.IdeasThatCanChangeYourLife.com.