Six Ways to Ensure Continual Growth
One of the most important lessons I’ve learned on my leadership journey is that I must continually grow in order to be my best and reach my potential. Now that I write that, it seems like a no-brainer. Of course, one needs to keep growing to reach full potential! Any idiot should know that! But I’m not just any idiot; I can be an exceptional idiot!
It’s not that I ever didn’t know it, really. It’s more that I was often conveniently unaware of it… or at least that I didn’t make the effort to stay in a growth mindset.
In fairness, I have gotten better at it over the years. Yay me! I’m more conscious of my need to grow, and I’m more active in seeking out growth opportunities. Here are six things I have learned that have helped me grow. Maybe they’ll help you too.
Release certainty
The more I learn, the more I realize there’s still so much I don’t know. I mean, I think I know a lot of things. And I am pretty smart–ask anybody! I’m usually convinced I’m right in whatever opinion I have on any given topic. But I’ve come to realize that opinions are not facts. (Breaking news again, I know.) And the number of facts I know is actually pretty small.
Oh, I’ll still happily give you my take on something if you want it, but I’ve gotten better at adding, “But I could be wrong.” And it’s been life-changing. Releasing my need to be right has put me in a much better position to learn and grow. Because what’s the point of learning if I already know?
Embrace curiosity
So, this is sort of the other side of the coin from releasing certainty. If I’m able to acknowledge that I don’t already know, the logical next step is to want to know. That’s curiosity in a nutshell.
And the great thing about curiosity is that if you’re truly curious, you aren’t picky about whom you learn from. You become better at engaging with people, which makes you a great conversationalist and all around more likeable person. And you open up new sources of learning and growth in your life.
Reject stagnation
Ruts usually carry negative connotations, and for good reason. Someone said recently that ruts can help ATV enthusiasts navigate through mud bogs, something I wouldn’t know anything about personally. I guess that’s one good thing about them. But the point remains–generally speaking, ruts are bad and we don’t want to be in one.
So why do we stay in them? Why do we settle into our gross, uninspired, same-old-same-old and never leave? It doesn’t have to be that way. Shake yourself and do something to break out of your rut. Learn something new, read a book, take a class, do something, anything different to grow yourself for a change.
Seek discomfort
Again, this is sort of the other side of the coin from rejecting stagnation. We settle into ruts because they become comfortable after a while. Even if we never really set out to be there, we get used to it and inertia sets in and traps us.
The only solution is to fight the inertia, to intentionally start doing things that are outside your comfort zone. For me, recently, that’s been getting more involved in social media, which I’m terrible at. I am super uncomfortable posting literally anything. I’m terrified of making a blunder and going viral for all the wrong reasons. But I’m committed to doing it scared because I want the benefits–the growth–that I know will only come from getting uncomfortable.
Expand your circle
You may be aware of the law of diminishing returns. Applying it to the circle of folks we associate with suggests that the amount of learning and growth we realize from our proximity to them grows smaller after a certain point. And that stands to reason. I can remember being in absolute awe of what I was able to learn from certain people I met. Then, as our friendship matured, that sense of awe eventually wore off. That’s not to suggest the relationship soured. Quite the contrary, it got better and more comfortable with time. (We already talked about comfort, remember?) But from a strict growth vantage point, the biggest returns for me were in the early stages.
My point is not to abandon old relationships. Rather, if I want to continue growing, I should continue adding new people to my circle so that I enjoy learning from them also.
Crave wisdom
King Solomon advised his children, “Get wisdom, get understanding: forget it not.” To continue growing, we would do well to follow that same advice. Earlier in this piece, I referred to certainty and facts, which to me imply knowledge. Here, I want to differentiate that from what I mean by wisdom. While knowledge is the accumulation of facts and information, wisdom is the ability to apply that knowledge with good judgment, insight, and understanding of context. (Shoutout to Google for the assist with that; I couldn’t have said it better!)
True growth includes not only gaining knowledge, but also wisdom to use it in productive ways.
Which of these aspects of growth are you doing well?
Which might you need to work on?
What one action can you take today to start?
