Purposeful Growth

Dawn McIntyre’s The New 10 is a book specifically targeted to women, but men and women alike can benefit from McIntyre’s concise summary of 40 ways to improve your self-image. That’s the essential theme of The New 10: 40 Days to Creating a Boldly Beautiful Life From the Inside Out.

The New 10 refers to an holistic and healthy view of beauty, in contrast to the physical beauty standard set by Bo Derek in the 1979 film, 10. If you saw 10 you remember Derek as a physically gifted young woman with a perfect body. She so captivated the character played by Dudley Moore that he abandoned his life to shamelessly chase Derek.

But physical beauty seemed to be the total extent of Derek’s assets. Her list of subsequent hit films attests to her acting ability, and her virtual disappearance from public view gives us no insight into her other qualities.

A New You

McIntyre suggests a healthier approach to beauty. Her new definition of a 10 is “that all women are capable of feeling beautiful and that expressing that beauty is simply a matter of getting in touch with the (divine) light within…” Her new 10 is a paradigm shift from the physical beauty of flesh alone to the combined beauty of authentic and healthy mind, body, and spirit.

Though women are the obvious target of this philosophy, a man’s self esteem is just as important to his personal growth as a woman’s. Let’s look at some of McIntyre’s 40 daily shifts in thinking.

Day 1: Facing our fears and learning that personal growth involves overcoming fears. Indeed, I’ve noticed that feelings of fear are a clear signal of an opportunity for my personal growth.

Day 2: Deciding that we can’t please everyone and behaving in order to earn another’s approval is futile and inauthentic. A great affirmation she provides is, “It is none of my business what other people think of me.”

Days 3 through 10 deal further with changing our thoughts. Days 11 through 20 address our bodies, while days 21 through 30 target the spirit. The final 10 days help us see the extraordinary beings we are.

All in all, The New 10 seems very useful as a summary of healthy ways to think and suggested aspects of personal growth for men and women alike. But in 40 days? No way. Significant behavioral changes take much, much longer.

So someone expecting to read The New 10 and become a total new person in a month plus, will be frustrated and disappointed. A new you in 3 years wouldn’t sell as well to our culture of instant everything. But even the most dedicated personal growth advocate will have difficulty assimilating forty new ways of thinking, feeling, and behaving.

Still, The New 10 is worthwhile as a sample personal growth plan. McIntryre provides plenty of personal examples and suggestions for implementing each change. The New 10 is an easy read and worth a look. The author does plug some products and services, which made me a bit suspicious of her intentions, but other than that, The New 10 is worth the $13 price tag on Amazon.

You’ll find much more information on personal growth planning in these articles:
Professional Career Development Planning with Personal Strengths

Professional Career Development Planning to Prevent Job Burnout

A Personal Development Plan Example

Balanced Life In Ten Weeks

It’s clear from the recent research studies out of positive psychology that a fundamental component of purposeful growth should be our personal and unique strengths. This term gained popularity with Dr. Martin Seligman’s landmark book, Authentic Happiness, which introduced the concept of unique personal strengths and called them signature strengths.

At Seligman’s request, prominent psychology researcher and professor Christopher Petersen, PhD (A Primer in Positive Psychology) led a study of strengths resulting in a model of 24 strengths based on six fundamental and ubiquitous values of most cultures. A popular online site followed, where we could take a self-assessment questionnaire and receive an immediate profile of our signature strengths. This was an extremely useful tool for personal growth, as research studies indicated that when we utilize our signature strengths we’re most productive and creative; we produce work of high quality; and we’re happiest.

Both Authentic Happiness and A Primer in Positive Psychologyare good reads for anyone serious about personal growth; they’re both free of scientific terms and technical terminology.

Recently, researcher and entrepreneur Dr. Alex Linley released new information further extending and expanding the study of personal strengths. Linley’s Average to A+ expanded the discussion of benefits of using our strengths. His most recent book, The Strengths Book goes even further, describing a four-quadrant model of strengths and introducing another online self-assessment questionnaire, Realise2.

Linley’s strength model includes 60 character traits. His online personalized profile described my results in four categories when I recently completed the 20 minute exercise: Realized Strengths, Unrealized Strengths, Learned Behaviors, and Weaknesses. Two important new concepts from Linley are significant for those interested and committed to personal (and purposeful) growth:

1. We have our greatest opportunity for personal growth by focusing on our Unrealized Strengths. These are characteristics which produce good results for us when we use them, but we tend to under-utilize these strengths. Increased awareness and utilization of Unrealized Strengths can provide significant personal growth. As with Realized Strengths, Unrealized Strengths not only give us good performance, but they’re energizing behaviors, too.

2. Heavy use of the characteristic Linley calls Learned Behaviors can lead to burnout. This is because we’ve learned to use certain capabilities effectively, producing good results with them. BUT, Learned Behaviors are energy draining—we’re exhausted after using them. Dependence on Learned Behaviors can lead to burnout, not a good outcome for someone focused on personal or professional growth.

To better understand strengths, what they are and how best to utilize them in personal growth plans, I recommend reading Average to A+ and The Strengths Book; these too are written for the layperson.

Then take the free online self assessment of signature strengths and Linley’s Realise2, four quadrant self-assessment. Unfortunately, Linley’s questionnaire is not free, but is modestly priced at 15 English pounds, about $23.

For more information on Linley’s strengths model and how to apply it to your personal and professional growth, see Personal and Professional Development Plans Build upon Strengths for a discussion of building your plan on strengths and Professional Career Development Planning to Prevent Job Burnout for more on job burnout and how to avoid it.

See this Sample Personal Development and Growth Plan for an example of a comprehensive plan incorporating strengths.

Balanced Life In Ten Weeks