A professor named Richard Boyatzis studies leadership and personal growth. He came up with a model for the best way for us to improve ourselves. It’s called the Intentional Change Model, and here are the steps:

1. What does your ideal self look like? What skills does your ideal self have? In what areas is your ideal self an expert?
2. Take a hard look at your real self right now. How are your ideal self and real self similar? Those are your strengths. Gaps are where your real and ideal selves are different.
3. Create a learning agenda that builds on your strengths and reduces the gaps.
4. Try new behaviors, thoughts, and feelings in alignment with your learning agenda. If one thing doesn’t work, then try another!

The final point that Boyatzis stresses is the importance of having a person to journey with you through your intentional change. He says that trusting relationships enable us to experience and process each new personal discovery better.

Personal growth is a challenge. It takes analysis and hard work. As Boyatzis says, “People change in desired ways, but not without intentional efforts.”

Take some time to think about who you want to become. What can your ideal self do? How does your ideal self behave? What thought patterns or perspective does your ideal self have? My ideal self is a little more fit and financially more secure than my real self. Those are my gaps. My ideal self and real self are both confident and motivated. Those are my strengths.

Once we’ve identified our strengths and gaps, we want to create a plan! My plan would include more exercise and actions that will create more financial security. As part of my plan, I get to try different things to accomplish those goals. You get to experiment, too! It’s fun to try new behaviors and thought patterns.

We all want to be sure that we have a trusted friend or coach to help us process the journey and increase our awareness.

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