I would like to credit the two greatest influences for today’s article.
The first is a great client coaching conversation the other day, where I could clearly see how my client not only ‘got it’ intellectually, but had actually integrated significant change into his life; becoming a greater husband, father and boss. It made my day.
The second is Snow White.
One of my favourite (and most entertaining) movie reviewers on YouTube is called The Critical Drinker. He not only says exactly what he thinks, but he backs it up with a great technical understanding and knowhow when it comes to creating, telling and producing stories. He also has a great Scottish accent, and is a successful author of a fiction series.
Anyway, he has been following closely the trials and tribulations when it comes to Disney’s retelling of the Snow White classic, and it shaping up to be one of their biggest Disney movie financial losses of all times. Bugger!
It is not so much the reworking of the movie and some really bad choices when it came to the direction of the narrative and delivery of it, but for me, I am a people-person and I was fascinated by the lead actress (Rachel Zegler) and her significant part in helping the movie tank.
So what I want to talk to you today about is SELF AWARENESS.
How aware we are of ourselves, and our relationship to our inner and outer world.
My belief is that self-awareness is the stepping off point, and springboard, to a truly co-creative life experience.
Let’s check out the Snow White debacle first.
The cost (probably $100,000,000 or so) of “low” self-awareness
Firstly, I don’t personally know Zegler, so I can only hypothesize on her character, and underlying drives.
She is likely a lovely person when you are 1-on-1 with her, and there are no camera’s or recording devices present.
The truth is that I actually don’t know where to take this observation, now I come to write it, to ensure I keep the conversation intelligent and not just a useless rant about a young kid behaving badly, and having huge consequences for those around them (i.e. huge financial losses and brand damage).
Maybe I need to keep it simple.
Low self-awareness can lead to poor choices and decisions that are out of alignment with the world around you.
It causes you to have a limited or distorted perspective.
In the case of Zegler, it might be a combination of the influence of the environment (distorted perception of how others view you and your behaviour, plus likelihood of excessive praise), youthfulness and the lack of development of the prefrontal cortex of the brain (these limits self-regulation and the likelihood of doing or saying stupid stuff), and then the huge power of social media to amplify (and record) poor choices.
Her lack of self-awareness lead to poor choices, limited self-regulation, inability to receive or perceive feedback, and painted a large target on her back which may very well tank her career.
When people see someone behaving with low self-awareness, it can come across as narcissistic, self-obsessed, arrogant, delusional, annoying and out-of-touch with reality.
None of the things we want to see carved onto our gravestone.
Simply put the downside of “low” self-awareness can be catastrophic.
On the other hand…
The spectrum of Self-Awareness
I believe there is a spectrum of self-awareness, where things get better and better, the more self-aware you become.
I also believe that the ‘spectrum’ is not linear after a certain point, but becomes exponential.
That is, when your self-awareness gets to a certain point, the impact it has in your life is not just a little better than before, but everything changes.
Your health, your relationships, your professional potential, and your spiritual development.
I consider self-awareness to be above the body and mind.
It is like a wise part of self, that sits above the body and mind, and can actually see when the body and mind are doing something that is not beneficial or in alignment with who you want to be or become at your core.
This part of you sits high enough to see all of you, and your relationship to the environment around you.
And if you exercise it more, it even allows a heightened sense of awareness of the inner you: physically, mentally and emotionally.
You can be aware that you are angry, as opposed to just being angry.
You can see yourself doing anger, and from a higher perspective, you can determine if this is something useful, or useless, for you to experience.
You can even, from this stable perspective, understand the potential root causes of the anger.
You, in a higher state of self-awareness, can CHOOSE whether to stay in anger, as opposed to being REACTIVE to an emotional that causes you to behave poorly.
My other observation with the client who inspired this conversation, is that self-awareness is necessary to fully integrate a new habit or behaviour.
If you don’t have awareness of self, you cannot ‘see’ if something is working or not, or even ‘see’ when you go off course.
And my final point on the POWER (and necessity of tuning up your self-awareness muscles) is when it comes to your physical and mental health.
The more attuned you are to feedback – when it comes to your body and mind – the greater choices you can make when it comes to your health.
I like to think I am pretty self-aware, but the other day noticed a blind-spot.
I was recently back from Australia, pumped up to get back into our building project, and impatient to move about 10-15 cubic metres of rubble from one end of the yard to the other, chain gang style (with a shovel, pick and wheelbarrow).
After I had done about 8-10 wheelbarrow loads, my left knee started to speak to me with a bit of pain (For context, I had an anterior cruciate ligament (ACL) knee reconstruction back in 1997).
I became aware of the pain (ticks for ‘self awareness’ bit), but then I CHOSE to ignore it, and powered on with another 5 or so loads.
The end result may not surprise you…
A swollen knee and daily icing for the next 5-days (and 5 days where I could not work on my project).
Dumbarse!
So SELF-AWARENESS + ACTING on that (valuable) information = the best OUTCOME.
I guess we probably all know someone who might be pretty self-aware, but they don’t do anything with that knowledge, so in the end they aren’t much better off than the person who lacks self awareness in the first place.
Maybe that is the key message here:
1. Turn up the dial on your self-awareness.
2. Act on the feedback (otherwise your heightened level is not useful).
In Summary
LOW self-awareness can lead to poor choices (and a tanked career).
Awareness of our ‘environment’ is essential, due to the influence that our environment can have on our choices and behaviour.
HIGH self-awareness impacts all areas of our life, as it highly influences the quality of the choices we make.
Self-awareness without right action is not that useful.
Elevated self-awareness affords us the opportunity to SEE our emotions, without BEING our emotions.
My Parting Words
I hope this article came together for you.
I just wanted to highlight how important it is to work on our self-awareness, as the downsides can be disastrous, while the upsides can lead to joyful peace.
It enables you to be more in control, even in unfamiliar environments and circumstances.
You see the bigger picture, and your relationship to it.
I didn’t talk about it in the article, but the best way to develop our self-awareness is through meditation, mindfulness, time in nature, or anything else that reduces distraction and slows things down.
And in case you didn’t already figure it out – for me – ‘consciousness‘ is the same as self-awareness.
Adding it (consciousness) to anything makes that thing even better.
How self-aware are you?
What area of your awareness needs work?
Do you have a daily mindfulness practice to become more aware of yourself (physical and non-physical) in relationship to the world around you?
If not, nudge nudge.
Have a superb day and a self-aware week (where you actually act wisely on the feedback you are given).
Take care.
Carl
Quotable QUOTE:
“Elevated self-awareness affords us the opportunity to SEE our emotions, without BEING our emotions.“ Carl Massy
(Author of 18 Ways We Make Life WAY Harder Than It Needs To Be)
PS: Have you read or listened to this book yet? 18 Ways We Make Life WAY Harder Than It Needs To Be
