👋🏽 Welcome or welcome back to The Spark Files [TSF] - your treasured artefact for living audaciously and building a purposeful life you love.
THE RUNDOWN: RELEASE #3
Imagine having a secret sauce like a “personal psychic” that can predict outcomes based on available information. Like what you’re going to say, how you’ll react, which decision you’ll make, if you’ll gel with a certain person or fit in with a particular group. This release goes within. Are you in for the ride? 🏎️
OPENING THOUGHTS
Humans are beautifully complex spiritual beings experiencing the world. We’re multifaceted, paradoxical, multilayered, intricate, and ultimately, God’s wonderful creations.
⚙️ In engineering, we start by clearly defining the problem, then performing a root cause analysis to identify the underlying cause of what we are trying to solve.
📦In product, we conduct discovery to unearth user needs, turn those insights into requirements for potential product features, prioritize and build a minimal viable version, test with users, and iterate based on validated feedback.
🔬In science, we make an observation, form a hypothesis, gather data to test that hypothesis, examine the results and come to a conclusion.
👩🏽💻In Tech, we have an idea, break it down into components, build a prototype, test it, and then iterate using what we learned from the first version.
🧠 In Psychology, we ask a question or identify an area of interest (a phenomena), follow it up with research, investigate by conducting studies, and document findings.
The one goal across all these domains is to gather information, learn, and ultimately understand “the who” and/or “the what”.
BACKSTORY
I first got exposed to the concept of self-awareness in a state of confusion. I was in undergrad and in the process of a dissolving a friendship — I basically decided that the friendship no longer served me and brought so much chaos and harm into my peaceful life.
I remember sitting on my bed and feeling a mix of highly intensified emotions — anger, sadness, grief, freedom, betrayal, disgust, disappointment — the inkling was always there, I had now come to terms with reality.
In the midst of it all, I had sooo many questions and landed on two main ones:
Why do people do what they do?
How did I contribute to such an unhealthy dynamic? What role did I play?
It was from these two questions that my world started unfolding.
DEEP DIVE
Let’s go a little deeper.
💡What is Self-Awareness and Why Should You Care?
I’ll start by breaking down the word itself. Self and Awareness
Self: I define “self” as a sense of who you are. Your being and everything that encompasses you — the individual separate from others. A container for your unique identity and personal characteristics.
Awareness: Is the knowledge that something exists or that something is happening.
Combining both.
Self-Awareness: Is one’s ability to recognize, perceive, and understand oneself in totality and objectively.
The way I see it, self-awareness is less of a “knowing” and more a combination of recognition, acknowledgement, and realization. It cuts across three main areas:
Mindfulness of your Psyche i.e. your internal world - values, thoughts, emotions, beliefs, perceptions, motivations, and many more.
Your Relationship with Others i.e. how they influence you, perceive you, and differentiate you.
How you show up and interact with the (external) world.
If you have seen this iceberg before, give yourself a pat on the back for being an enlightened being. If you are seeing this for the first time, you’re in for a treat (go do some homework).
Awareness is sometimes mistaken or interchangeably used as consciousness. Both are states and exist in an experiential way that is nuanced. Let me break it down 👇🏽
Awareness and Consciousness
The Difference:
Consciousness is a broad state while awareness is focused and specific. Look into the science literature to appreciate the nuance of both.
Their Relationship:
One is a prerequisite for the other.
Some say there is no awareness without consciousness, others say there is no consciousness without awareness. Which is it? I frankly am still deciphering the science behind both.
My understanding is that awareness exists within the realms of consciousness; meaning you have to be conscious in order to be aware. Which makes perfect sense to me.
Depending on how you approach both states, you may come to a different conclusion. If/when you do, share with the community by commenting on this release!
I do know that both have to do with the mind. And a big question to answer, is awareness cognitive or conscious?
Know Thyself
Tying it all back to Self-Awareness and why you should care.
When you become self-aware, you navigate the world and complex situations more confidently in a well-informed way.
📝 TSF TAKEAWAY
Self-Awareness is the key to unlock your best life.
Through reflection and active introspection, we become aware of just how much our external world and the life we experience is shaped by our internal world.
When we develop the curiosity to discover ourselves, the patience to learn about ourselves, and the courage to accept who we are while working on aspects of ourselves that can be better, we give ourselves the grace and permission to build purposeful lives aligned with our best selves.
It all starts with you.
1. Decisions
You make decisions with your best interests. It’s so easy to think that we make our own decisions independently.
That can be true but for the most part, we are heavily influenced by people, places, ideas, narratives, situations, feelings, and our own conditioning/patterns.
A statement circulating social media that encapsulates just how much the perception of others can influence our choices, goes “ do you really like it or do you want others to see that you have it?” — call it peer pressure or conspicuous consumerism 🤷🏽♀️.
This example is skewed towards “purchase decisions”. In a general sense, we make decisions from the moment we wake up, all throughout the day, till when we go to bed.
Some happen automatically as our brains are designed for efficiency while others happen momentarily or deliberately.
For example, you planned to read a book after work and by the time work comes to a close, there’s an event happening that you just learned about. Everyone else is going and you decide to go last minute due to FOMO.
Your decision driver here is an emotion. Why did you forego reading to attend the event?
A personal example is that I know not to go for a grocery shop when I’m hungry because I always come back with snacks instead of ingredients to make a proper meal.
With this knowledge, I save my time and money by ordering food and not having to make a second trip to the store OR shop before I get hungry — the more you know, right!
You are better equipped to maneuver different type of social situations. Humans are social beings, no man is an island.
From social media to social circles, self-awareness allows you agency and autonomy to navigate these social spaces.
Do you like connecting 1:1 or in huge gatherings? Are you the life of the party or you crave creating memorable experiences? Where do you fall in the social dial of extraversion?
Do you need alone time to focus and then recharge by connecting with people?
Are you afraid of confrontation or you actively welcome difficult conversations?
What emotions and behavior come to light when interacting with others in certain contexts? It helps you develop your interpersonal intelligence.
3. Career and Professional Spaces
You set yourself up for success especially as you build your career.
You understand the kinds of places you thrive, how you focus, where you do your best work, and how to make the most of your environment.
In the workplace, you can identify the kind of personalities you can bond with or accommodate. You go for the type of work that lights you up and leans into your strengths.
All of these factors contribute to a thriving career in alignment with who you are.
REFLECTIONS
Becoming self-aware is not a one and done “activity”, it is continuous discovery of ourselves as we grow and evolve in our daily lives.
My YouTube channel banner reads “We’re all a Work In Progress”, I mean that in every way. Who you were three years ago is not the same person you are today. Down to the physiological levels, the human body regenerates thousands of new cells every waking day.
If that happens to the body, imagine what happens in your psyche as you develop, learn new information, experience new environments and people, create memories, and form new perspectives - this level of complexity is what fascinates me and blows my mind.
Let your curiosity guide you 🛣️ — to yourself and to subscribe to my channel! 😉
YOUR THOUGHT SPARKLERS
💭Are you self-aware? How would you describe yourself? Do you know your values, motives, and desires?
💭Do you take the time to check-in with yourself? How often?
💭When was the last time you leaned into introspection and reflection?
🛠️Recs, & Resources
📽️ YouTube Videos
📚Books
Book to help you learn about the mind, your consciousness, and how to become aware of yourself.
Stay Audacious,
Chikodilee 🤎🤎
