It is normal and relatively common for people to seek to improve themselves and improve their way of being. However, on some occasions the change sought is very deep, structural. This is the case of those who consider changing their personality completely. Is it possible to become a very different person from what you have always been?
In this article we will see some tips and recommendations about how to change your personality by introducing different habits into your daily life
Personality is by definition something that is maintained over time, that tends to be constant. Specifically, it is the set of psychological dispositions that guide us towards certain behavioral dynamics and not others, and is based on a genetic component and a learned component, which is born from experience.
However, as with most psychological phenomena, Personality is not an element imposed on us in a deterministic way, but we can influence it in surprising ways. It is practically impossible to completely turn it around and become something in which absolutely nothing of what we once were is noticeable, but radical changes are possible with effort and time.
So, to change your personality follow these tips.
1. Concrete your objectives
The goal of “changing my personality” is too abstract, too ambiguous. If you don’t divide it into different specific objectives, you will get lost in vagueness and you will not make significant progress
Therefore, write down on a sheet of paper what aspects of your way of being that you would like to change, filtering your priorities, and focus on it. In the end, it is absurd to propose to completely change all aspects of one’s personality; You have to target those areas that cause problems or that are perceived as weaknesses.
2. Create the commitment
Whenever we set ourselves an ambitious goal that requires effort, it is good to make sure that we are fully committed to it. One way to do it is to talk about it with other people, in order to create expectations and have more reasons not to give up.
Generating this kind of self-obligations is very positive to achieve goals and not throw in the towel, even though it apparently seems to limit our freedom.
3. Distance yourself from your previous failures
On many occasions, one of the obstacles that makes it difficult for someone to change their personality for the better is the fact that they fall into the trap of believing that they will fall again and again into the type of failures they fell into in the past.
It is true that we all have weaknesses that characterize us, but that does not mean that we cannot arm ourselves against these types of errors. With enough effort and learning, we can develop extraordinary skills Even if we don’t, this simple thought helps us stop being afraid of those aspects of life that we have never been very good at, which serves to stop us from being so vulnerable to them.
Your changes in personal development should only concern you. It is clear that people always have reasons to talk behind one’s back and criticize, but that is precisely why what others think should not obsess us; No one knows us as well as we know ourselves, and that is the reason why the vast majority of moral assessments and judgments that we receive from others have no value.
Being aware of this, and that everyone has the same weaknesses for which we are capable of hating ourselves on certain occasions, helps to put things in perspective and not feel condemned to always be the same: around us people change radically for better and worse, and you can do the same. The point is to guide this change so that it is for the better.
5. Surround yourself with people who inspire you
Much of learning occurs spontaneously by the simple fact of surrounding ourselves with those who give us reasons to improve and content on which to work to become better.
If we avoid falling into the trap of constantly comparing ourselves with those we consider the best, We will begin to absorb and adapt to our way of being those elements that we consider positive: have more patience, learn to listen and put ourselves in the shoes of others, be more creative by not discarding the most bizarre ideas, etc.
6. Don’t assume your own identity, modify what you already have
It is important not to cover ourselves with tics that define the personality of others, but rather to develop our own version of what we want to become. For example, if we want to work on self-esteem to trust more in our abilities, we should not use another person’s expressions or body language in an imposter way, but rather look at what we usually do and make corrections.
Paying attention to yourself is an essential element to change your own personality, since you have to work with what you have; pretending that we are a blank sheet of paper will only generate frustration.
7. Introduce small changes in your daily life
Spend some time each day paying attention to what you do and correcting it as you go to achieve the desired goal. The rest of the day, don’t worry about it. This way you will do work intensively, while later you will not have to put in any effort and you will be able to recover (which prevents you from getting too stressed).
Little by little, The repetition of those moments in which you make an effort to change will make them automatic and you will be able to gradually expand the time window that you dedicate to developing an improved personality.
8. Have the help of psychologists
If necessary, psychologists can help you through psychotherapy. Professional support is usually very useful to find new strategies to improve and detect errors that had gone unnoticed.
