Personal Development
Personal Development
MODULE 1
★ Ideal self is the self that you aspire to be. It is the one that you hope will possess
characteristics similar to that of a mentor or some other worldly figure.
★ Actual self is the one that you actually see. It is the self that has characteristics that
you were nurtured or, in some cases, born to have.
★ The actual self and the ideal self are two broad categories of self-concept.
★ Self-concept refers to your awareness of yourself.it connotes first the identification
of the ideal self as separate from others, and second, it encompasses all the
behaviors evaluated in the actual self that you engage in to reach the ideal self
ACTUAL SELF
● The actual self is built on self-knowledge.
● Self-knowledge is derived from social interactions that provide insight into how
others react to you.
● The actual self is who we actually are. It is how we think, how we feel, look, and act.
The actual self can be seen by others, but because we have no way of truly knowing
how others view us, the actual self is our self-image.
IDEAL SELF
● The ideal self is how we want to be.
● It is an idealized image that we have developed over time, based on what we have
learned and experienced.
● The ideal self could include components of what our parents have taught us, what we
admire in others, what our society promotes, and what we think is in our best interest
There is negotiation that exists between the two selves which is complex because
there are numerous exchanges between the ideal and actual self.
These exchanges are exemplified in social roles that are adjusted and re-adjusted,
and are derived from outcomes of social interactions from infant to adult development.
Alignment is important. If the way that I am (the actual self) is aligned with the way that I
want to be (the ideal self), then I will feel a sense of mental well-being or peace of mind.
If the way that I am is not aligned with how I want to be, the incongruence, or lack of
alignment, will result in mental distress or anxiety. The greater the level of incongruence
between the ideal self and real self, the greater the level of resulting distress. Personal
development modules ultimate aim is greater self-knowledge that will lead to higher
alignment between these two personality domains.
PERSONAL EFFECTIVENESS
❖ means making use of all the personal resources – talents, skills, energy and time, to
enable you to achieve life goals.
❖ Your knowledge of yourself and how you manage yourself impacts directly on your
personal effectiveness. Being self-aware, making the most of your strengths, learning
new skills and techniques and behavioral flexibility are all keys to improving your
personal performance.
❖ Skills also determine whether real actions are performed in accordance with the plan.
1. Determination. It allows you to focus only on achieving a specific goal without being
distracted by less important things or spontaneous desires. It may be developed with
the help of self-discipline exercise.
2. Self-confidence. It appears in the process of personal development, as a result of
getting aware of yourself, your actions and their consequences. Self-confidence is
manifested in speech, appearance, dressing, gait, and physical condition. To develop
it, you need to learn yourself and your capabilities, gain positive attitude and believe
that by performing right actions and achieving right goals you will certainly reach
success.
3. Persistence. It makes you keep moving forward regardless of emerging obstacles –
problems, laziness, bad emotional state, etc. It reduces the costs of overcoming
obstacles.
4. Managing stress. It helps combat stress that arises in daily life from the environment
and other people. Stress arises from the uncertainty in an unknown situation when a
lack of information creates the risk of negative consequences of your actions.
5. Problem-solving skills. They help cope with the problems encountered with a lack
of experience. It increases efficiency by adopting new ways of achieving goals when
obtaining a new experience.
6. Creativity. It allows you to find extraordinary ways to carry out a specific action that
no one has tried to use.
7. Generating ideas. It helps you achieve goals using new, original, unconventional
ideas. Idea is a mental image of an object formed by the human mind, which can be
changed before being implemented in the real world. For generating ideas you can
use a method of mental maps, which allows you to materialize, visualize and
scrutinize all your ideas, which in turn contributes to the emergence of new ideas.
MODULE 3
Human Development focuses on human growth and changes across the lifespan, including
physical, cognitive, social, intellectual, perceptual, personality and emotional growth. The
study of human developmental stages is essential to understanding how humans learn,
mature and adapt. The human being is either in a state of growth or decline, but either
condition imparts change. Some aspects of our life change very little over time, and are
consistent. Other aspects change dramatically.