Welcome to the Awareness Resource Guide, a new blog series that I’m developing based on the idea that increased awareness, of self, others, and the world, is a learnable skillset that can offer great outcomes for anyone who pursues it.
Here’s my backstory. As a person I think I was always seen as smart, thoughtful, and analytical. I spent many years putting these qualities to work by devising and managing the systems by which humans work together to do a thing. Working in corporate, putting in place operational things like lean/agile, or a product strategy and transparent planning system. Systems, with people at the center. I was a total process nerd who could talk your ear off about lean principles or efficient workflows.
After doing this in some big jobs, with a lot of responsibility, I finally recognized one pattern in myself: I kept burning out. With the benefit of hindsight I came to realize that I had burned out a few separate times in my career.
This realization led me on a journey of discovery. Through tons of reading, coaching and therapy, I have developed (and I’m still working on) a new, powerful skill of awareness. It slowly became clear that hustling and grinding for external validation of my worth was my jam, my default mode. And thankfully I have also realized that self-worth is something I can have inside of me vs. searching for elsewhere. I no longer need to prove myself with hard work inside a system that isn’t set up to help me thrive as a person.
Now that I have had this insight, I have realized that what makes humans tick has been the perennial interest of my analytical brain this whole time! I was focused on human systems in the past, and now I have a passion for helping other thoughtful and analytical people have this same epiphany and develop their own sense of awareness. I am now in my phase of nerding out about the human experience.
I think the primary benefit of increased awareness is stronger agency. When you are aware of what’s going on inside you and around you, you can make better choices for yourself, your family, and your world.
For me, the first step is to develop self-awareness. I can look back at my career and clearly see some pivotal moments where my self-awareness was raised by external events or people, and I wish I could have had some of these insights sooner. When a senior executive pulled me aside and said “If you would just stop wearing t-shirts and Converse you could go really far”, I wish I could have taken that feedback on board and slightly flexed my personal style without losing my genuine self and donning my “executive façade” for so many years. Or when a boss once said “Rebecca, stop bringing me your facts and figures” I wish that I could have had more curiosity about what he needed, rather than feeling a bit righteous about his lack of interest in “the truth”. Hah.
Developing self-awareness is different for every person, but the basics can be learned with a simple and iterative set of practices like mindfulness, journaling, and slowing down to pay attention. It is simple, but perhaps not easy. We'll get into that in future blog posts.
And it is not just self-awareness that is important. It is awareness of others and what’s going on with them. It is awareness of human cycles and how we all learn and grow over time. It is awareness of the systems that we all operate within, and how they influence things. This blog is an attempt at “Rebecca’s Unified Theory of Being Human”. But that’s a mouthful so I’m just going to call it the Awareness Resource Guide.
Why am I doing this? I think developing this skill of awareness has a chance to save humanity from some dark times. If we were all aware of what’s really going on for us each moment, had more curiosity and empathy for others, and the agency to choose our best response to a hard moment, things would inevitably be better between humans. That’s my truth, that’s my purpose in sharing these thoughts.
Every month I’ll focus on a new topic, tell you why I think it matters, and share resources I’ve found along my way. I’ll give you a short, medium and long-form resource so you can dip in to any interesting topic with the time that you have available. And as this list grows, I’ll put all of the resources in one central place for your ongoing reference.
This blog is an attempt to use my new increased awareness and agency for good, in a way that feels authentic to me – wordy, nerdy, and hopeful.
For this month, here are three resources to learn more about self-awareness:
If you have been on a similar journey of discovery, I’d love to hear about what you’ve learned. Come participate in this conversation!