How can you understand which steps are right for you? Why don’t universal pieces of advice always work, and how can you take into account your own resources, life circumstances, and values when building a personal development strategy?
Anna Kuzmenko suggests looking at personal development comprehensively — through the interconnectedness of physical and emotional well-being, relationships, professional fulfillment, finances, and personal values. In her practice, she emphasizes that there is no single strategy that works for everyone. There is a strategy that works specifically for you.
“Small steps only work when they are yours.”
I consider the word “yours” to be the key.
Every person has their own life experience, personal values, different levels of resources, different circumstances, and a different starting point. Therefore, the same action can be effective for one person and completely inappropriate for another.
“There is no universal development strategy. There is a strategy that works specifically for you.”
In my practice, I increasingly notice one particular pattern. People rarely struggle because they do not know what to do. More often, they feel lost among a huge number of pieces of advice and possible options.
Some people advise working more. Others suggest taking a break. Someone recommends scaling a business. Someone else suggests changing careers. But none of these recommendations takes the most important thing into account — you.
That is why I believe small steps should be chosen not only based on the goal. They should be formulated with all areas of life in mind.
After all, development is not a separate project. It is a system in which the following areas are interconnected:
• physical well-being;
• emotional resources;
• family and relationships;
• professional fulfillment;
• finances;
• personal values.
When one of these areas is neglected for a long time, it affects the others. That is why I always look at development holistically.
“A small step should not simply bring you closer to your goal. It should support your integrity as a person.”
For example, if a person is experiencing emotional exhaustion, their first step may not be launching a new project, but restoring their resources.
For some, development begins with strategic planning. For others, it starts with an honest conversation with themselves. And for someone else, it may begin with the decision to finally finish something that has been draining their energy for a long time.
And all of these steps can be equally right.
Because they correspond to the particular stage of life a person is currently experiencing.
“The right small step is not the one others recommend. It is the one that corresponds to where you are today.”
That is why I choose an individual approach.
An approach in which a strategy is not created from a list of fashionable recommendations, but from an understanding of a person, their goals, capabilities, and inner readiness for change.
After all, great results do not begin when we start doing more. They begin when we start doing what is truly ours.
“True development begins the moment you create your own steps.”
Perhaps today it is worth asking yourself just one question:
Are the small steps I am taking now truly bringing me closer to my goals, or are they simply helping me live up to other people’s expectations?
Author: Anna Kuzmenko
Photo: Anna Kuzmenko
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