What's missing in personal growth products?

[dorian86]

The more I see personal growth products including videos, tapes and books the more I get lost in it all. There hundreds of products all saying slightly different things but around similar subject lines.

I couldn't help but to thing what are the main things that are missing in all these products. I've been thinking about and can't quite figure it out.

Could be in the way that they are communicated and presented, the content talked about or even a lack of practical and EASY information that makes it simple for the person that read the material.

Maybe you can give me your thoughts on this.

Thanks.

Dorian

[Brutha]

Could be in the way that they are communicated and presented, the content talked about or even a lack of practical and EASY information that makes it simple for the person that read the material.

Unfortunatly personal growth just isn't easy.

[Lucas]

The thing is, you have to sift through and find out the things that work best for you, and what you can implement into your life the best. So basically, the thing missing, is YOU.

And Brutha is right on with this.

[silicon toad2000]

Personal Growth is the journey. Once someone can make it through the web of products and gain something relevant to themselves and insightful from all the confusion, THEN they are ready to start on their journey.

[Jennihul]

The one thing missing in all personal growth products is a clone of you that actually takes all the recommended actions while the real you procrastinates and/or looks for magic bullets in the next product, or the next product or the next product....

In essense, you really only need to fully implement the tenets in the first product you buy...then you wouldn't need the others.


Jennifer

[Keith]

Personal Growth may not be easy (though that seems kind of a limiting belief to me) but the OP is right in that an awful lot of PD books are significantly padded. Many authors take an entire book to explain PD concepts that could be covered in a chapter. Of course, individual chapters don't sell.

IMO, this is part of Steve's success (the fact that he's good doesn't hurt either ) - the blog format doles out the information in chapters or mini-chapters.

OTOH, if you look at a book like "Zen and the Art of Motorcycle Maintenance", you don't really appreciate and understand the meaning found at the end of the book unless you've followed the author through his journey to reach that point.

There's also the fact that your personal needs are just that - personal. Noone out there is going to write "A Guide to Dorian86's personal development". Data-mining the info out there for the bits that are relevant to you is part of the journey.

Some people think Tony Robbins is the greatest, others think he spouts meaningless babble. What they're really saying is "I found this personally applicable", "well I didn't!".

All that said: If your gut tells you something is missing from the books you've been reading, something probably is. Try reading a bit more widely. Read the Tao Te Ching, the Grapes of Wrath, the Koran - anything that you think might offer a different perspective.

[The Cloud]

The quote in Keith's signature describes exactly what's wrong with the idea of "personal growth." It almost universally implies that it will make you "better," which in turn implies that you are "worse." True growth is a process, not of betterment, but simply of change, of flowing from one state into another state that is perhaps a little bit wiser. You can put whatever definition you want to it, but in the end there is no better or worse.

[Stephen]

In a nutshell I see it as this way:

Imagine a circle. The circle is your personal growth.

Imagine an hydraulic jack beneath the circle which you must take ACTION to pump the circle higher.

Now, imagine above the circle, a pallet of house bricks. The house bricks represents inertia or ZERO ACTION. This weight with the help of gravity is always forcing your circle down unless you counter that force with your jack (ACTION).

Can you see the difference? Positive growth actually requires you to do something. Negative growth requires no effort.

This fits into personal growth products nicely. We can be told and shown better ways to work the jack, and better ways to remember to work the jack, but it still always requires ACTION.

There should be a health type warning on these products, something to the tune of....

"FINANCIAL WARNING. This product actually requires you to take ACTION"

[Power]

You have to pass your exams before you go to the next level.

Think about it,... in school you need to pass your exams before you go to the next level. You are given information and you need to learn the information that was presented to you.

What happens when you get an "F"?...Remember when you studied for a test and you failed? or got a really low score? maybe you didn't even studied at all... The main point is that the information was presented to you in class and maybe you were given time to learn it. The moment you received your test score and you received an unsatisfactory score, it usually means one thing... it means you haven't learned the lesson/information.

Now in the school of life, when you pick up a book or listened to a personal development information, simple enough, it is easy to understrand and you know you got the grasp of the information that was presented to you. Remember when you studied and you even believe in your core self that you understood the information. Exam time arrived and you got a "D+"... What the heck just happened!? Hey,... you were sure you answered the questions right,... you were even 100% sure you'll bet your lunch money that the answer was 'C' and not A, B, D, or E.

So my question to everyone is... How do you know that you have learned the lessons in personal development informations when you didn't undergo an exam or test and be graded to your level of competency/understanding?

Remember the school's experiments? yeah, they were fun and exciting, I loved them too. So now you have listened to a personal development information or read a book. What experiments did you perform? Did you try and test the information out? Did you succeed in the experiment? Did you learn anything?... Of course you've learned something!... "I've learned my lessons, I won't do it again!" Proclaiming you've learned something is an empty conviction. Your actions reflects what truths you possess inside

I think that's the missing key in personal development. You need to find a way to test yourself unbiasedly and grade yourself to find out if you have learned something at all... whether it went in one ear and then out the other.

[Stephen]

Originally Posted by Power

You have to pass your exams before you go to the next level.

Think about it,... in school you need to pass your exams before you go to the next level. You are given information and you need to learn the information that was presented to you.

What happens when you get an "F"?...Remember when you studied for a test and you failed? or got a really low score? maybe you didn't even studied at all... The main point is that the information was presented to you in class and maybe you were given time to learn it. The moment you received your test score and you received an unsatisfactory score, it usually means one thing... it means you haven't learned the lesson/information.

Now in the school of life, when you pick up a book or listened to a personal development information, simple enough, it is easy to understrand and you know you got the grasp of the information that was presented to you. Remember when you studied and you even believe in your core self that you understood the information. Exam time arrived and you got a "D+"... What the heck just happened!? Hey,... you were sure you answered the questions right,... you were even 100% sure you'll bet your lunch money that the answer was 'C' and not A, B, D, or E.

So my question to everyone is... How do you know that you have learned the lessons in personal development informations when you didn't undergo an exam or test and be graded to your level of competency/understanding?

Remember the school's experiments? yeah, they were fun and exciting, I loved them too. So now you have listened to a personal development information or read a book. What experiments did you perform? Did you try and test the information out? Did you succeed in the experiment? Did you learn anything?... Of course you've learned something!... "I've learned my lessons, I won't do it again!" Proclaiming you've learned something is an empty conviction. Your actions reflects what truths you possess inside

I think that's the missing key in personal development. You need to find a way to test yourself unbiasedly and grade yourself to find out if you have learned something at all... whether it went in one ear and then out the other.

Your talking about TAKING ACTION, right?

[Power]

Originally Posted by Stephen

Your talking about TAKING ACTION, right?

Oh no... not at all.. I'm not talking about taking action.

This is my main point:

"How do you know that you have learned the lessons in personal development informations when you didn't undergo an exam or test and be graded to your level of competency/understanding?"

"You need to find a way to test yourself unbiasedly and grade yourself to find out if you have learned something at all."

or let me rephrase:
The missing key points in personal growth products is how to assess how much we have learned (Assessing how much you have learned).

[Stephen]

Originally Posted by Power

Oh no... not at all.. I'm not talking about taking action.

This is my main point:

"How do you know that you have learned the lessons in personal development informations when you didn't undergo an exam or test and be graded to your level of competency/understanding?"

"You need to find a way to test yourself unbiasedly and grade yourself to find out if you have learned something at all."

or let me rephrase:
The missing key points in personal growth products is how to assess how much we have learned (Assessing how much you have learned).

But isnt the whole point of reading/watching/listening to PD media to actually go out and "DO" something?

Only when we "DO" it (post-theory) can we assess if it has worked.