rethinking self-improvement
learning to work with your nature, not against it
These past few days I’ve realized something that’s been bothering me, and I can’t help wishing I had seen it much earlier. Looking back, I’ve forced myself into so many things that drained my energy completely. I thought it was growth, or at least that’s how I justified it to myself. But somehow I always ended up in situations that left me unhappy.
Self-knowledge as the first step to growth
In the past few years, I’ve often overworked myself and gone against my own nature, all in the name of discipline. And in the world of self-improvement, discipline is often seen as the ultimate key. But all of that happened because I wasn’t listening to what was going on inside me. How could I? I didn’t even truly know what was good for me and what wasn’t. That’s why I want to bring your attention to this.
If I could go back to my younger self, I’d tell her you don’t have to be productive all the time, and you don’t need to feel guilty if you’re not. I mean this in the most loving way. I kept pushing myself through things I thought would improve my life, believing they were good for me. But more often than not, they left me exhausted and overwhelmed.
Only recently have I discovered a new approach. I’ve come to understand that you shouldn’t fight against your nature—you need to work with it. You can’t simply tell someone with ADHD to meditate and sit still for an hour, or suggest to someone with autistic traits that they should attend more events and be around strangers. That’s working against who they are. A piece of advice that works for one person can completely throw someone else off balance. There are other methods that work better, and when you understand yourself, you can discover what truly supports you instead of blindly following someone else’s advice. That’s why, before diving into self-improvement, it’s worth taking the time to truly get to know yourself (first).
It’s easy to say, “Get to know yourself first.” But in reality, it’s not about doing one before the other. Getting to know yourself and growing as a person should happen side by side. That’s why the term improvement feels a little off to me. I prefer gentler words like support or nourish. Because what exactly am I trying to “improve”? My habits, my routines, my lifestyle? And if that’s the case, shouldn’t I first understand what I actually need before I blindly reach for any method out there?
I think the idea of self-improvement is often misunderstood. The focus tends to be on constantly doing something productive: exercising, reading, writing, meditating, swimming, taking cold showers, starting a side business, doing yoga, enrolling in courses… and preferably fitting it all into one day. Just listing these things makes me feel stressed.
This kind of self-optimization can be pushed so far that it leads to serious health issues—burnout, depression, chronic stress. That was never supposed to be the point of self-improvement. And yet, I find it sad how easily it’s drifted in that direction, and how many of us, myself included, have unknowingly slipped right into it.
To me, self-development is really about consciously walking the path of transforming your being through an upward cycle of learning, opening, and finding balance, moving toward a deeper sense of wholeness and inner harmony. But above all, it’s about learning to let go—and that also means getting to know and understand your being.
My path to healthy self-improvement
So today I thought I’d share a few things that have helped me understand myself better and shape my “self-nourishment” in a way that doesn’t work against me, but supports me (I’m still learning as I go):