Meditation has proven benefits for emotional regulation and is one of the many ways to develop self-management skills.
5 Steps to Develop Self-Management Skills
What’s the first thing you think of when you hear the phrase “soft skills”? Most likely, you thought of social skills. There’s no doubt developing social skills is important. But here’s a soft skill that doesn’t get enough attention: self-management skills.
What are self-management skills?
Self-management skills are a special category of soft skills. This subclass of soft skills enables you to regulate your thoughts, actions, and feelings.
You might not realize it but the way we deal with ourselves has a huge impact on our lifestyle.
Now that most of us are working or studying from home, developing self-management skills can mean the difference between finishing your workload or wasting the day on Netflix.
Thankfully, it isn’t that hard to build self-management skills.
1. Evaluate yourself
Before even coming up with a plan of action, take the time to assess what self-management skills you already have and what you still need to develop.
Doing this lets you pinpoint the areas where you need improvement. Not only that, this exercise also shows you your pre-existing strengths. These strengths can be leveraged to help you develop the self-management skills you lack.
Create two side-by-side lists: one for weaknesses and one for strengths. Start listing down what you have trouble with when working. You might find that you’re short tempered and lack emotional control. At the same time, you may find you’re a disciplined person who sticks to their plans.
2. Create your ‘battle plan’
Think of how you can leverage the strengths you found to support your weaknesses.
Remember the example from earlier? A disciplined person can develop their anger management skills by adding meditation to their daily routine. By diligently following this routine, they can experience the benefits of improved emotional regulation and stronger emotional control.
And speaking of routines.
3. Restructure your routine
Changing your life doesn’t mean you need to take drastic measures.
Slowly change your daily routine to include the self-management skill you’re trying to develop. Say you want to become a healthy eater but you never seem to have the time to cook for yourself. Make a deal with yourself to have at least one meal a week that’s healthy. When you can stick to it consistently, schedule more healthy meals for yourself.
4. Assess the changes
Reflect on the changes you made during your first week of developing self-management skills. Take out the notes you made at the start of the week. Start by considering whether you found all the weaknesses you needed to change. If not, write down the new ones you discovered.
When that’s done, jot down the difficulties you encountered with developing self-management skills. Note what worked best for you as well and consider how you can use a similar strategy to tackle the other weaknesses on your list.
5. Readjusting your strategy
Sometimes changes don’t get results right off the bat. That’s okay — developing self-management skills is all about consistency and persistence.
In readjusting your self-development strategy, throw out the techniques that didn’t work and improve on those that did. Maybe meditation is boring for you and just makes you feel annoyed. Meditation may not be helping you deal with your anger problems but how about exercise instead? Would jogging work better for you?
On the other hand, cooking your own meals may be helping you eat healthier. Reinforce this habit by making it easier for you to stick to it. The more effort it takes to do something, the likelier it is for you to take shortcuts when you’re tired. You can help yourself eat healthy throughout the week if you plan recipes and meal prep on the weekends.
Take charge of your life
Developing self-management skills can empower you to make big improvements in your life. What seem like small changes add up to create a new skill that not only impacts your work life but your interpersonal relationships and internal happiness as well. By starting small, slow, and steady, you’ll develop self-management skills that promote good habits and boost your quality of life.
