How To Start Your Own Personal Growth Journey Pt. 1
by Brad Spangler
Have you ever felt like you weren’t living up to your full potential? I know I have, and several years ago, that feeling within me led to a decision that would radically change my life. What was that decision, you may ask? Well, that decision was saying “yes” to personal growth. As a short definition, we will define personal growth as a lifelong and intentional process of continual improvement in the areas of your life that you value most. Now, before we go any further, I think it’s essential that I share a little more about the events in my life that led me to take personal growth more seriously.
Before Anna and I moved to Norway, we would spend a lot of time taking walks together and dreaming about what it would be like to live on the mission field. Both of us were beyond excited the day we landed in the Oslo airport, ready to run full speed into our future. Unfortunately, we made a critical error by getting ourselves busy with the day-to-day tasks and life in general. In short, we stopped dreaming together.
We also ran into some difficulty when people who were very close to us made personal choices that did not align with our values. Their choices not only hurt us but other people who were around them at the time. Between the lack of vision and the wounds of betrayal, it became easy for us to just “go through the motions.” You know, just exist. Sure everything on the outside seemed fine, but inwardly all I wanted to do was distract myself from any pain or lack of purpose I was feeling. This of course led to Anna and I getting sucked down the rabbit hole of either YouTube or social media most evenings.
After some time, I began to feel God speaking to my heart. To be honest, it sounded a lot like Mufasa’s spirit speaking to Simba in the Lion King, saying, “Son, you are more than what you’ve become.” Then one day, sitting in class at a RHEMA school weekend, I heard one of the instructors talk about John Maxwell and his personal growth habits. He spoke about how Mr. Maxwell had intentionally made a personal growth plan for the last 50 plus years! “Wow, I didn’t even know that was a thing,” I quietly said to one of our team members. I had heard about New Year’s resolutions, but a laid-out plan for self-improvement year after year was news to me.
Shortly after that experience, I attended a team-building meeting, and the person leading that meeting began talking about personal growth again. She gave an example about how one of the executives for Chick-Fil-A made it a goal to listen to seven leadership podcasts a day to grow in his capacity to lead others. I was immediately convinced that personal growth was necessary for me to add to my life if I wanted to live up to my full potential.
As I said initially, getting serious about my personal growth has radically changed my life. Anna and I have started dreaming together again. Instead of feeling hurt from past experiences, I feel empathy toward others. God has given me a vision for my life, and for the first time in a long time, I believe it’s possible to achieve. This idea of personal growth is why I will break down the four components of my own growth plan for the next several weeks. I have a desire to help others fulfill their God-given potential. If this resonates with you, then I want to leave you with this question, “Who do you need to become in order to fulfill God’s call on your life?”