Personal Growth in 2009 & Beyond

Written by Kevin Touhey - 16 Comments
Categories: self improvement

running-with-seagulls
Image courtesy of Eschipul

Around this time of the year, it is commonplace to discuss resolutions, goals and objectives for the next year; but I want to do something slightly different. I want to discuss two topics that test our character and allow us to live the life we dream about: forgiveness and vision. I want to discuss how to truly forgive and have a clear vision of what we want to do, where we want to go and most importantly, how we want to feel during our time on this beautiful planet.

True Forgiveness

I understand that forgiveness is no easy task. This is especially true of the most important aspect of true forgiveness; self-forgiveness.

The ego screams loudly and clearly that we should focus on all the wrongdoers in our lives. I can assure you from personal experience that if you are able to hold up a mirror and be kind and forgiving to yourself, you are on the path to true freedom. You will be unable to move forward on your path to true personal growth if you are full of blame, condemnation and engaged in default escape behaviors rather than dealing with the issues you need to address.

Holding on to resentment is like taking poison and hoping the other person will die. It is always about you. Responsibility is about making a choice to feel more vibrant. It is your responsibility to move out of past hurts and into the true bliss of the present, without the excess baggage of condemnation. Forgiveness is the freeing of the self from the past, and facing the future wiser, with renewed hope and faith. Forgiveness is an unconditional gift of love. This doesn’t mean “I will forgive you if or when”, but “I forgive you because I must if I ever hope to continue my own healing.”

In my process of psychological and spiritual growth, I laid the groundwork for a higher level of true forgiveness. This entailed letting go of judgments against any of the people, places or things in my life that I thought had treated me unjustly. Even more powerful, I stopped my own ego from continually judging myself for all of the real or imagined injustices I’d committed. I stopped being the hypocritical bad guy in my own consciousness. When I really began to forgive myself, my actions and behaviors followed. When I realized that I was not exempt from  wrongdoing and got real with myself, the level of forgiveness went to a  depth that has brought with it peace and serenity.

We must forgive now. We must forgive in 2009. We must forgive always. Life is too short to hold grudges. Life is too short to waste time on negativity; we should put our energy to use in trying to realize and live our dreams.

A Clear Vision

Let your vision fly. Do not block its path with limitations based on past experiences.   When you have a clear vision for your career path, relationships, family, and community, it is easier to develop a day-to-day life plan. It is important to step out of the box of your present circumstances when envisioning your future. Visioning is about creating a new, fresh reality.

Resist the very human, ego-based urge to “keep it real”, while envisioning your life. Even though your vision might not seem entirely logical at times, go for it anyway. The sky and beyond is the limit. You do not need to fixate on one single vision. Play with it and have fun. Your vision and life plan will evolve and become an absolute reality if you live in the present moment.

Goals are the individual step-by-step process of making your vision a reality. Goals are the process of laying out a plan of right actions that are aligned with your values and vision and will propel you forward toward complete satisfaction when you arrive at your goal destinations. Goals are the means you use to take the incremental steps to reach achievable targets.

If you set goals that do not reflect your values, it can lead to a tremendous amount of frustration and ultimately, failure. It is important to monitor how you are feeling as you move along the continuum of goal accomplishment. This is why it is important to set some short-term and mid-range goals. You will be able to determine if you are on the right track toward making your vision a reality.

All of your goals should be based on your value system. When you set goals based on what is truly important to you, obstacles and problems that arise will not impede your progress. You will be more committed and persistent in your effort to reach your goals. Many people pull up short of achieving their goals out of fear that they may fail. They give up too soon. It is important to use fear to propel rather than paralyze.

Overcoming fear by staying committed, persistent, and consistent will provide the emotional integration you need to achieve your goals. 2009 will be wonderful!

Thanks for your time folks! Merry Christmas and Happy New Year!

About the writer: Kevin Touhey is the Amazon Best Selling Author of The Miracle of Optimism. If you enjoyed this article you may like to visit his blog or follow him on Twitter.

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  • http://www.freedomeducation.ca Stephen Martile

    Vision is massive!

    It’s the magnet that pulls you towards your goals instead of you having to push towards them.

    Stay strong with vision,

  • http://www.surefireselfimprovement.com Omar

    I certainly agree with you that one of the hardest things for us to do is to forgive others and even to forgive ourselves for mistakes we made in the past.

    It is much easier to hold on to all that anger and resentment even though it eats us up inside.

    Great focus for the coming year. Thanks for sharing.

    Omar

  • http://guidance2live.com Ted

    Yes, I totally agree. Forgiveness is one of the first steps in receiving deep inner healing. It is so freeing and powerful when we embrace the need to be forgiven and the need to forgive others.

  • http://www.jayfrawley.com Jay

    Vision is so key. If you can not see where you are going, how will you know you reached your destination? Great Post!

  • http://www.theinternalarts.com Johnny Kuo

    Vision and forgiveness are two things I’ve been trying to incorporate into my own life. What you’ve discussed applies equally well to resolutions, goals, and objectives for the New Year. It’s important to aim high with your visions even if it seems impractical. Aiming too low can counter-intuitively make it less likely that you’ll achieve success. Milestones (goals) help you form an actionable plan towards your goal, and making sure your visions and goals have personal significance really helps ensure progress and eventual success. Forgiveness is the one I feel too many people get hung up on. People beat themselves over the head for things out of their control or which are really inconsequential in the grand scheme of things. Learning to forgive yourself is crucial to letting go of the unnecessary baggage weighing you down.

    I really enjoyed that post. Thanks.

  • http://www.healthmoneysuccess.com Vincent

    Using fear to propel instead to paralyze us is definitely a great advice. Whenever we set new goals and take on something that is unfamiliar to us, we tend to have fear in our mind, but we should always use fear to our advantage and help to push us to achieve more.

    Cheers
    Vincent
    Personal Development Blogger

  • http://www.kyakare.com Mumbai

    Nice article with interesting insights. I guess fine tuning our values first is the most important thing.

  • http://www.themiracleofoptimism.com Kevin Touhey

    Thanks for the great feedback everyone, I appreciate your comments. Happy New Year!

  • http://extraordinarylikeme.blogspot.com/ Elm

    Thank you Kevin. What a wonderful and truly insightful piece. For me you summed it up beautifully when you wrote: “Life is too short to waste time on negativity; we should put our energy to use in trying to realize and live our dreams.” Thank you for sharing your journey with us.

  • http://keytostressfreeliving.com/blog Linda Hampton RN, MSN

    Forgiveness
    Even that word says a mouthful. For me it has been just when I thought I had forgiven someone I get the pangs of resentment.

    Your right about the ego. It has a way of raising up it’s head sometimes when you least expect it. Is true forgiveness an art or a science. It’s probably a little bit of both.

    As for me forgiveness seems to be a long road but I know if I keep going I will find a way to allow my forgiveness to stick. And maybe I just hit on something here and that is the word allow.

    Thank you sor sharing

  • http://www.personal-development-coach.net Simona Rich

    Anger and fear are the two hardest things to overcome. Yet when you start living consciously, they fall off you. It is great to live without these two emotions bothering you.

    Many people find it hard to forgive. They would rather keep all the anger inside them. It is unwise to do this as diseases will manifest as a result of anger not released.

    You can force yourself to tolerate those who hurt you. Yet this is not true forgiveness. To really forgive means to let go of all the negative feelings you hold towards the person or circumstance.

    When you really forgive, you feel free. You have peace of mind. You feel happiness inside you.

    You can learn to forgive by understanding the oneness of all of us. Why would you be angry at someone who is connected to you?

    Different people are on different consciousness levels. It is silly to be angry at someone who is still developing. You were on his/her consciousness level too. It does not matter if you remember this or not. We are all becoming but at different speeds.

    Do not hold any negative feelings towards others. Know that they will eventually improve themselves and become better human beings. It is just a matter of time.

  • http://mark-foo.com Mark-Foo dot Com | Life Empowerment

    You can’t attain true freedom and happiness if you don’t learn to forgive for resentment is a strong negative emotion which conjures up much negative energy that could effectively lead to self-destruction.

    Nevertheless, to forgive is indeed easier said than done. Nobody has successfully teach one to forgive. But there’s no reason we shouldn’t be actively seeking to learn how to forgive for it helps us to become a better and happier person.

    Cheers~

    Mark

  • http://wisecurve.com Relax

    Thanks a lot

    My goal is to get to know more people around

    your friend Relax ~

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