When I first got in touch with personal development books and blogs, I think I was about 18 or 19 years old. By then, I’ve enjoyed about 15 years of regular education. It took a while to come to the shocking conclusion that none of the things I learned through personal development resources even remotely came close to what I’ve learned in school over those 15 years!

I asked myself: “What did I learn in school?” It all started at the age of four, when you learn to play, to read and to write. Then, you get into more advanced reading, math, geography, and of course gymnastics. After all, a mind functions better in a healthy body. We learn to be creative, get an occasional acting class,we went on school camp. We studied our history. Then it was time to go to high school. Modern languages (English, Dutch, French and German), ancient Greek and Latin, history, geography, economics, physics, chemistry, arts and music, biology, computer skills, gymnastics and yes, I was editor-in-chief of the school paper. We went abroad a few times, had drama class – believe me, there was more drama in the regular classes – and for a few years, we had a subject called sociology. For two hours a week. The latter came closest to what I later figured out was called personal development.

I dare to make the following bold statement: Our education system does not at all pay attention to active personal development. Yes, you can argue that being in school and engaging in social activities there contribute to personal development. You are right. Sitting in a bar every night is also a social activity. So is a visit to a psychologist. Get my point? As long as you get good grades, and don’t bother your teachers or fellow class mates, no one will ask questions. No one will expect you to develope beyond that. After all, good grades are all you need to get a good job, make money, and live a happy life. Doesn’t it?

There is something horribly wrong with our education system: It supports mediocrity! My best friend Danny Mekic’ quit highschool at the age of 15. He wasn’t a bad student. Not at all, even. However, he had another plan. He wanted to start a company. We happened to be in a highschool that had special classes for young athletes. They would get a programme that fits with their training schedule, and special support for those who would take part in international tournaments. Excellent! But someone who had the ambition to master the art of entrepreneurship had no other choice but dropping out. He didn’t fit in, and his ambition did not meet the mediocre standards of regular highschool education. Eight years later, he was elected the most successful young entrepreneur in the Netherlands and is one of the most developed people I know.

An overwhelming majority of people who have achieved something significant in their lifes, no matter if they bacame successful politicians, wealthy entrepreneurs, religious leaders or just people who are living the life of their dreams in any other way… they will confirm to you that apart from their regular education, the way they educated and developed themselves has been a major, if not a defining factor in their ability to manifest their success. Danny, and many other people I know have achieved considerable success, read about psychology, inform themselves about what’s going on in the world, dive into the why-questions, study the stories behind other successful individuals, read books about how to achieve goals, how to build successful companies, how to maintain great relationships…

If we want to get our society to a higher level in the decades to come, we need to embed personal development heavily into our education system. Until then, develop yourself! Read books, blogs, visit seminars, talk to people you admire. It will help you to get from where you are to where you want to be, no matter how ambitious your goals are.

How do you develop yourself? Leave a post in the comments field below!

Photo by A. Feldmann

With new elections coming up here in the Netherlands and daily coverage of the election campaign, I was wondering whether this intense celebration of democracy actually makes us happy. I decided to dive into the matter, and found out that a well-oiled democracy is not at all guarantee for happiness. I also figured out that in a very undemocratic country, it’s hard to be happy, although there are some interesting exceptions!

There are several attempts to measure happiness, which is rather subjective compared to the objectively measurable economic results of a nation. One of those attempts is the Happy Planet Index. I compared the Happy Planet Index with the Democracy Index rank of The Economist, which you can find behind the country name:

1. Costa Rica (27)
2. Dominican Republic (73)
3. Jamaica (49)
4. Guatemala (79)
5. Vietnam (149)

Let’s look at the five most democratic countries in the world according to the same Democracy Index, compared to their rank in the Happy Planet Index, which you can find behind the country name:

1. Sweden (53)
2. Norway (88)
3. Iceland (94)
4. The Netherlands (43)
5. Denmark (105)

Let’s try another source! According to the World Database of Happiness, the following countries make up the top-5 highest ranking countries based on the question: “How much do you enjoy your life on a scale 1 to 10?” The list is based on the averages from 2000 to 2009. Again, behind the country names, you can find their level of democracy according to The Economist’s Democracy Index:

1. Costa Rica (27)
2. Denmark (5)
3. Iceland (3)
4. Switzerland (8)
5. Canada (11)

This list already gives a better indication to believe that happiness and democracy are related. However, to get more complete picture, I decided to look after some random, undemocratic countries. Chad (166) is the second last country on the Democracy Index, after North Korea. It ranks 92nd in the World Database of Happiness. Tunisia ranks 141st on the Democracy Index, and 71st in the World Database of Happiness. Ghana is the 94th most democratic country in the world, and ranks 101st on the World Database of Happiness. Laos ranks 157th in the Democracy Index, but 59th in the World Database of Happiness.

It is interesting to conclude that a good democracy does per definition lead to a happy population. It is hard to define why that is the case, but it might well be that in those countries, democracy is often taken for granted and people divert to other reasons to be unhappy about. The fact that happiness doesn’t work out well in countries where democracy is all but present, can be explained by that these countries are often plagued by social and economic problems, strong military presence and a lack of basic needs.

The abovementioned conclusions are by no means scientific. But they do give a direction, and I will continue to explore this fascinating subject the upcoming weeks and months to go deeper into the matter in my upcoming book, How To Live Wow!?

photo by joatklipa

There is a lot of information available on the internet that should help you with your personal development. However, some of this information digs deep in your mind and raises questions you might have never thought about. Eventually, when used the wrong way, personal development information also has its risks. My respected colleague Henrik Edberg from The Positivity Blog wrote an excellent post about the five most common ways personal development can “screw with your head,” as he says. I summarized them for you and added some thoughts of my own as well.

1. It helps you to overcomplicate stuff, instead of making things easier

You have looked in books and on blogs. You haven’t found perfect answers so you look a little more, just to be on the safe side and to avoid failure and the pain that comes with that. And so the problem becomes bigger and more complicated in your mind for every book or article you read. Taking action becomes something you start to fear more and more because it all seems so huge and complicated now.

2. It gets you emotionally hooked and makes you want to read more and more

And so little action is taken because that is uncomfortable and scary. While getting another hit from some personal development source feels pleasurable and safe. It kinda feels like you are making progress and going somewhere as you read that awesome book. But shortly after you have read it that feeling diminishes. And so you read another one to get a rush of those positive feelings again.

My thought: You do not grow faster by reading more stuff in a shorter time. Eventually, developing yourself takes time on the long term.

3. It leaves you confused, instead of secure

One problem with the information overload age we live in is that you can get more than you can handle. For free. Tony Robbins may say one thing. Eckhart Tolle might say another thing. Taking in advice from 10 people at once can confuse you and lead to ‘paralysis analysis’ – not doing anything because you cannot make up your mind.

4. It makes you feel like you aren’t ever ready or good enough

This can become a big problem. When you get hooked on reading this stuff you may start to feel that aren’t quite good enough yet to start taking action. That you aren’t good enough to succeed with something you’d like to do. In part it can be a form of protection from the pain and effort that comes with action. In part it can be because knowing more and more but not using it keeps a low self esteem in its place (or makes it sink even lower).

My thought: Never forget that you became a better person since you consciously started working on your personal development.

5. It makes you think that things will be perfect and you will be too

It’s very easy to fall into the trap of looking for magic pills. That basically mean you look at something – a book or a just a tip – as a complete and quick solution for your problem. You think that this thing will “fix you”, just like a pill from the doctor could. But this is self improvement. Sure, someone may make a lot of money or lose a lot of fat really quickly. But for many any improvement will be gradual. It will be slow sometimes and quicker at some points. It’s a process that takes months or years.

Little by little you improve yourself, but never to perfection. Over time all those small steps forward really start to add up.

So what to do about it?

How can you avoid these problems? A few tips Henrik uses:

• Keep these things written here in mind. Just keeping these pitfalls in mind and being aware of them help to be a bit careful about how I think and behave’
• Set limits. It is useful to set limits for yourself so you don’t overconsume personal development material. For example, make sure that you are consistently taking action towards your goals 80 percent of the time. And then you read and study 20 percent of the time. Not the other way around;
• Take some action immediately after having learned something. Don’t wait, then you just want to read and prepare even more. Jump in instead and do one little thing to get started.

Photo by jmitch