EMPOWERING EASE, JOY & EFFECTIVENESS
Executive Education, Personal and Professional development Programmes
Executive Education, Personal and Professional development Programmes
Why Personal Development is Social Development
- Pouring 'Me' into 'We'

Bella Enahoro
How would your life be different if you knew that just by working on yourself you were benefiting others? What is it that prompts us to undertake our personal journey? For some of us we've always had a strong sense of our interior lives and privileged it over our external circumstances, finding it to be a source of guidance, comfort and refuge. For others of us, the personal journey comes as a shock, sometimes on the heels of a crisis. And then there are those of us who quietly realise our lives are not working and waiting for something to happen is not the answer.
Whatever the cause, once we enter into that personal path, a whole new universe opens up for us. We become engaged in living life from the inside out. What does that mean?
Initially we are in the process of bringing up old beliefs, governing thoughts and unacknowledged assumptions which no longer serve us. Usually we have absorbed these beliefs over the course of our lives, we've taken in thoughts which govern our lives in ways we no longer wish to live and we become willing to become conscious of our erroneous assumptions. Wayne Dyer has a wonderful book addressing just this process called Your Erroneous Zones. We are in the process of creating new paradigms for our existence. No-one can do it for us.
For the people surrounding us, who may be accustomed to interacting with us as rescuers, caretakers, co-dependents – they are accustomed to having us live without boundaries, jumping into or being pulled into everyone's drama. And they may be 'ticked off' with us for now minding our own business, for refusing to mind their business for them. We are learning what is our business and what isn't. We are learning not to waste time in business that isn't ours. Business that isn't ours is business we can't control and we didn't cause. We now give up the role of 'General Manager of the universe', we've given up our place on the 'Council of despair' and we resign our seat as 'Chairperson of the public complaints committee'.
We may meet with accusations of being distant, not caring about anyone (usually meaning them), selfishness and the list goes on – all amounting to the accusation of not being who they are accustomed to having us be. And their observations may well be true. Why? Because we're now 'deep sea diving', going to the depths of our lives and there's a pretty good chance that we'll 'come up' different.
It's easy to make the mistake of thinking we have to take others with us on our journey – be they partners or friends. It's easy to think we have to explain something to someone. Or we may feel we have to hold ourselves back, fearful of losing our friends, spouses and sometimes even our jobs. Holding ourselves back might stave off the inevitable in the short term but we may quickly come to realise, we are actually creating more hurt for ourselves and for others by resisting the flow of our lives.
So we let go. And when we do finally let others go – they are afterall travelling their own journey, in their own way and time – we set ourselves free. We learn where our real power lies, which usually is not about controlling other peoples choices and lives, even if they're hurting themselves through those choices.
We learn what getting sucked into other's drama is exhausting and unsatisfying. We see that perpetual complaining only keeps us in the situation and we would do better to begin to line ourselves up with the solution. We will leave people behind. Yes WE WILL LEAVE PEOPLE BEHIND.
That's not good, that's not bad. It simply is. And we are not doing anything wrong! Neither are they.
And now we participate in the world in a different way. With our more consciously developing self, we go out into the world and participate consciously instead of reacting to it from lack of awareness. Our lives are a social enterprise – with nothing to prove and everything to give and this affects how we make decisions – what we get involved in and how we do so.
We learn to become the world we want to see and from there we can reach out to others, reach out into communities who are ready to change their lives.
Copyright ©Bella Enahoro Jul 2011
For more articles go to more.
Whatever the cause, once we enter into that personal path, a whole new universe opens up for us. We become engaged in living life from the inside out. What does that mean?
Initially we are in the process of bringing up old beliefs, governing thoughts and unacknowledged assumptions which no longer serve us. Usually we have absorbed these beliefs over the course of our lives, we've taken in thoughts which govern our lives in ways we no longer wish to live and we become willing to become conscious of our erroneous assumptions. Wayne Dyer has a wonderful book addressing just this process called Your Erroneous Zones. We are in the process of creating new paradigms for our existence. No-one can do it for us.
For the people surrounding us, who may be accustomed to interacting with us as rescuers, caretakers, co-dependents – they are accustomed to having us live without boundaries, jumping into or being pulled into everyone's drama. And they may be 'ticked off' with us for now minding our own business, for refusing to mind their business for them. We are learning what is our business and what isn't. We are learning not to waste time in business that isn't ours. Business that isn't ours is business we can't control and we didn't cause. We now give up the role of 'General Manager of the universe', we've given up our place on the 'Council of despair' and we resign our seat as 'Chairperson of the public complaints committee'.
We may meet with accusations of being distant, not caring about anyone (usually meaning them), selfishness and the list goes on – all amounting to the accusation of not being who they are accustomed to having us be. And their observations may well be true. Why? Because we're now 'deep sea diving', going to the depths of our lives and there's a pretty good chance that we'll 'come up' different.
It's easy to make the mistake of thinking we have to take others with us on our journey – be they partners or friends. It's easy to think we have to explain something to someone. Or we may feel we have to hold ourselves back, fearful of losing our friends, spouses and sometimes even our jobs. Holding ourselves back might stave off the inevitable in the short term but we may quickly come to realise, we are actually creating more hurt for ourselves and for others by resisting the flow of our lives.
So we let go. And when we do finally let others go – they are afterall travelling their own journey, in their own way and time – we set ourselves free. We learn where our real power lies, which usually is not about controlling other peoples choices and lives, even if they're hurting themselves through those choices.
We learn what getting sucked into other's drama is exhausting and unsatisfying. We see that perpetual complaining only keeps us in the situation and we would do better to begin to line ourselves up with the solution. We will leave people behind. Yes WE WILL LEAVE PEOPLE BEHIND.
That's not good, that's not bad. It simply is. And we are not doing anything wrong! Neither are they.
And now we participate in the world in a different way. With our more consciously developing self, we go out into the world and participate consciously instead of reacting to it from lack of awareness. Our lives are a social enterprise – with nothing to prove and everything to give and this affects how we make decisions – what we get involved in and how we do so.
We learn to become the world we want to see and from there we can reach out to others, reach out into communities who are ready to change their lives.
Copyright ©Bella Enahoro Jul 2011
For more articles go to more.