Module 1
Understanding Self for
Effectiveness
-Sugandh Katyal
Understanding Self
WHO AM I ?
Understanding of oneself: knowledge or
understanding of one's own capabilities,
character, feelings, or motivations.
Self-awareness is the first step in creating what
you want and mastering your life, where you
focus your attention, emotions, reactions,
personality and behavior determine where you go
in life.
Self-awareness is the capacity to look inward
and understand our own feelings, emotions,
stressors, and personality. These key
understandings play a critical role in
influencing our judgements, decisions, and
interactions with other people. It helps us in
identifying the areas where we need change and
transform ourselves into better people.
Benefits to practicing
self-awareness
Helping you understand yourself in relation to
others.
Helping you understand why you are feeling a
certain way.
Empowers you to manage yourself effectively.
Enables you to continue to build and develop
meaningful relationships.
Improves your awareness of friends, family,
and co-workers.
Identify Take care
your of your
emotions health
How to build
Supportive self-awareness See yourself
Relationships honestly
Recognize
Work your
towards strengths &
growth weaknesses
Thinking
Sensing
Awareness Feeling
Wheel
Doing
Wanting
Being unsure and insecure about
understanding the self can result in not being
successful or not caring about life.
It is important to understand the self and
what type of person to be.
Self-understanding Self-Concept
Self-concept Self-understanding
Self-concept is all the behaviors, beliefs, and
abilities one has about him or herself and
what is understood from the responses of
others.
Self understanding is the ability of the
individual to understand his or her own
behaviors, actions, and reactions.
Ideal self: The ideal self is the person you want
to be. This person has the attributes or
qualities you are either working toward or
want to possess. It's who you envision yourself
to be if you were exactly as you wanted.
Self-image: Self-image refers to how you see
yourself at this moment in time. Attributes like
physical characteristics, personality traits, and
social roles all play a role in your self-image.
Self-esteem: How much you like, accept, and
value yourself all contribute to your self-
concept. Self-esteem can be affected by a
number of factors—including how others see
you, how you think you compare to others, and
your role in society.
Self-identity: When you believe in your idea of
yourself it is known as self-identity. If you
believe in your version of yourself then you will
not let any negative remark affect your self-
identity. The benefits of understanding Self-
Identity is that we get to explore and
understand ourselves.
Real Self, Role Self, Ideal Self
The real self and the ideal self are terms used to
describe personality domains. The real self is
who we actually are. It is how we think, how
we feel, look, and act.
The real self can be seen by others, but because
we have no way of truly knowing how others
view us, the real self is our self-image.
Real self: the one who reflects the individual
true qualities, his aptitudes, inclinations and
characteristics.
Ideal self: that is constituted by the
characteristics to which the individual aspires.
It is a guide of the self. It is how we want to be.
Role self: what the individual feels he must, it a
guide of the self too. An identity we adopt.
T.E.A Model of Self
THOUGHTS
EMOTIONS
ACTIONS
The three aspects of the T.E.A. Model -
thoughts (internal processing), emotions
(internal states), and actions (external
behaviours), are constantly influencing one
another.
If we change one, then the others change too.
Techniques for Self - Awareness
JOHARI Window of Self
There's a saying that paraphrases the Johari Window
Model:
"If one person calls you a horse, ignore them. If 3
people call you a horse, look in the mirror. If 5 people
call you a horse, buy a saddle."
It just means if there are enough people telling you
something, you may want to listen to them. Doesn't
mean they are 'correct', it's just they have a reason for
thinking that way.
The Johari Window Model was created by Joseph
Luft and Harry Ingham to help understand how we
process information and our self awareness.
The Johari Window Model is a useful tool
in self-analysis: after all, you cannot
consciously change what you don't know.
The key is to be open to the feedback other
people are giving you. Everybody knows at
least somebody that has some glaring blind
spots and just won't listen.
Quadrant 1: Open
These are traits that are out in the open.
These are the things you and other people
know about you.
Ideally you want to have the 'open' window as
large as possible. In a team environment, this
is where we are most productive or
constructive.
Quadrant 2: Blind
These are the things about you that you are not aware
of but other people see. Characteristics in this quadrant
can be the most important quadrant for you to use.
This quadrant is probably the most sensitive to provide
feedback than the other 3 quadrants: especially if it's
not a positive characteristic.
There are areas in life where we may really be worse
than we think, and the best way is to just be open to (or
give) constructive feedback. It's not easy when when we
are kept in the dark about things, but not all of us are
ready to accept this kind of feedback.
Quadrant 3: Hidden
These are things that you know about that others do not.
The hidden self could be feelings, talents, information
(secrets), fears or anything that a person does not make
known to others.
It could be something deep or something "light".
The point is, there are some things that don't need to be
kept hidden, but that choice should be made by us and
not imposed by others. We all have secrets; just be sure
it's not holding you back in some way. After all, the more
we reveal about ourselves in a high trust environment the
more effective your team will be.
Quadrant 4: Unknown
These are the things about you that you and others do
not know. This area represents the opportunity to
explore new ideas about yourself.
Within the unknown window lies your hidden abilities
or skills. This is the area where you have the
opportunity to explore new things. Since they are
unknown, there's usually less pressure on you to "try"
the things in this window.
On the other hand, within the unknown lies repressed
feelings, unknown fears, behaviors conditioned since
you were a child.
SWOT Analyis of Self
Internal
External
Strengths:
To help you understand your strengths, picture
yourself as a competitive product in the marketplace.
A personal strength is an asset to you as a product
and can be used as a way to differentiate yourself
from others when interviewing or trying to obtain
your next promotion. Examples of strengths: Strong
project management skills, ability to improve or
reengineer processes, experience and training in
presenting to large audiences, proven successful sales
abilities.
Weaknesses:
A personal weakness is a liability or an area of
opportunity for growth. These are characteristics you
could improve upon to increase future job
opportunities. Examples of weakness: Disorganized,
uncomfortable speaking in front of groups, tendency
to procrastinate, poor listener.
Opportunities & Threats:
When thinking about your opportunities and threats,
it is easier to begin with the “threats.”
Try comparing yourself to people you’ll likely
compete against for that next job or promotion. Then,
as objectively as possible, judge your threats and
determine possible ways to overcome them.
Here are some examples:
Threat: Other candidates have college degrees.
Opportunity: Go to night school and finish my
bachelor’s degree.
Threat: Colleague X is much better at presenting in
front of groups.
Opportunity: Take a speech class or join a program,
seek out opportunities to present in front of audiences
Introspection for Self
You want a life change that will last.
A regular practice of self-reflection and
introspection can help you take the right actions
today to achieve your goals in the future.
The goal of self-awareness is actionable insight
you can use to change your life for the better
Introspection is the process of attempting to
directly access one’s own internal psychological
processes, judgments, perceptions, or states.
Self-reflection involves the “examination,
contemplation, and analysis of one’s thoughts,
feelings, and actions.”
Insight is “the clear and often sudden discernment
of a solution to a problem.” It’s the result of self
reflection and introspection.
Introspection gives you access to understanding
yourself, self reflection lets you process what you learn,
and insights are the answers you come up with and that
you can act upon.
Self-awareness increases your ability to exercise control
over your emotions by reducing stress and anxiety.
Through self awareness, you become less likely to veer
off track when difficult emotions surface. Instead of
doing something you later regret, you’ll be better
equipped to ride out emotional troughs.
“The world as we have created it is a
process of our thinking. It cannot be
changed without changing our
thinking.”
― Albert Einstein
Perceptual
thinking
Analytical
thinking
Conceptual
/Abstract
Thinking thinking
Patterns
Non-directed/
Associative
thinking
Reflective
thinking
Critical
thinking
Creative
thinking
Types of Thinking
Critical
Application Analytical
Associative Creative
Concrete Abstract
Practical
Critical thinking
Critical thinking refers to the process of using existing
understandings and processes to evaluate the relative
credibility or usefulness of new information. This type
of thinking usually incorporates the component
details of a particular observation and other factors
that might affect it. People who think critically often
have excellent judgment or evaluation skills.
Analytical thinking
Analytical thinking involves using your understanding
of an entire idea or challenge and identifying the parts
that compose it. Analysis is usually an orderly, step-
by-step way of thinking. Many people who think
analytically approach tasks in a methodical and
structured way.
Abstract thinking
When you think abstractly, you understand general
ideas and then make meaningful connections between
them. Abstraction can help you find deeper or even
hidden meanings in the events you observe and your
surroundings. You may find relations between
originally random concepts and use this information
to create new possibilities.
Associative thinking
Associative thinking is an open-ended mode of
thought that involves creativity and imagination.
Using association entails purposefully allowing the
mind to connect seemingly disparate thoughts and
ideas to one another. Some people correlate
associative thinking with daydreaming or free
association.
Creative thinking
Creative thinking is a mode of thought that involves
using existing knowledge to develop new, original or
innovative ideas. Creativity sometimes challenges the
accepted ways of doing particular tasks or processes.
This type of thinking can help you approach
challenges with a new perspective.
Application thinking
Application occurs when you transfer a concept
to a practical purpose. This type of thinking often
happens when you encounter a new situation—
application thinkers can use their existing
knowledge to figure out how to approach it.
Concrete thinking
Concrete thinking is the ability to understand and
apply facts. This type of thinking is usually literal
and direct, and some people associate this type of
thinking with concrete or perceptual thinking.
Concrete or perceptual thinking can form the basis
of more complex types of thought that may rely on a
solid understanding of facts.
Practical thinking
Practical thinking is defined as considering ways to
adapt to your environment, or changing your
environment to fit you, so that you are able to
pursue a goal. It is referred to as street smarts or
common sense. Practical thinking is not concerned
with gathering additional information or analyzing
what you already know in multiple ways. It is
concerned with taking the knowledge that you
already have and effectively using it to solve
problems in the real-world and taking action.
Observe
How to determine
your type of Evaluate
thinking
Reflect
Express your views
How do we plan education for an unknown
job market or unknown needs?
What is more important in a job, analytical or
critical thinking or both?
