You Must Know: Personality Development (Part 1)

Source: Husband and Wife Store

There is much interest in personality development these days. If you open almost any magazine, watch the ads on television, ads in web page or social media, or look at some of the popular books in bookstores, you will see many evidences of this interest.

Some of the suggestions offered in sources like these are helpful ones; others are poor, if not actually harmful. Many suggest short cuts to an outward personality – one which might seem pleasant on the surface but which could never be real unless it reflected the person you really are.

The Meaning of Personality

A great many people seem to think a person either has personality or does not have it. The fact is, everyone has personality – distinguishing qualities or characteristics that make him different from anyone else in the world.

Your personality includes your body and its functioning, your appearance, you habits and attitudes, and your abilities. Personality is also the result of all your experiences. So you see, your personality is all of you.

What is usually meant by the expression “he has lots of personality” is that a person has the kind of personality which makes other people want to know him. Actually, as you realize from its definition, no one person has “more” personality than another. Each person has his own special personality.

Personality is not fixed. It can grow and change and improve if you are willing to work at developing it. Dr. Karl M, a famous psychiatrist, once described personality as “all that anyone is, and all that he is trying to be.”

A Slow Process

Every new experience you have, every new problem you learn to meet, gives your personality a chance to develop more fully. Personality development does not take place over night, however. It is a slow process. It cannot be accomplished in a “few easy lessons.”

If you start now to think about the kind of person you want to be, you can help your personality grow so that you will become more nearly that kind of person. You must begin, of course, by recognizing yourself as you are today – and under – standing some of the factors that have contributed to your personality.

Next article You Must Know: Personality Development (Part 2)