Top 2 Tips for Self-Improvement

Are you the kind of person who is constantly seeking ways to improve? Do you look for the next best method to become better?

To remain active and take full advantage of the very short time in this World, nothing is more meaningful than to pursue a life of development and betterment.

It is through improving ourselves (that includes spiritual, emotional, physical and mental) that we get the most out of life and in the process enrich those moments that we share with others in our lifetime.

What we have to realize is that there is never an end to the journey of learning, developing and improving. The more we grow, the more we should realize there is so much more to learn and understand out there. The capacity of a human to acquire and practice new skills and knowledge is limitless, so it’s impossible to reach a point of not needing to take part in self-improvement.

In this hub I’d like to briefly cover 2 tips on self-improvement which I feel are very important and may help others in their efforts for continuous learning and self-development.

Prophet Muhammad (PBUH) said – “Actions are only by intention, and every man shall only have what he intended. Intention and sincerity go hand in hand. When you do a good deed, it’s not considered a good deed until you have the right intention and then even further to whether you were sincere in your actions. If what you are doing is for the creations of Allah, then that’s what all it is. You won’t be recompensed in the hereafter. But if one does a good deed for Allah. Then Allah rewards them in this life and the hereafter.”

Based on the above, what we need to realise is that our intentions have a direct relationship to the outcome we should expect when taking certain actions. Many people set new-year’s resolutions which after a few months, weeks or even days in some cases turn into failures which only reinforces the concept of ‘failure’ in our subconscious mind.

To be successful one should make a clear and pure intention, for those who have difficulty in adhering to self-imposed restrictions or activities start off with something very small that you can achieve and then build up your successes doing so will train your emotions, mind and soul to work towards fulfilling your intentions.

Eliminate Time Clutter - Create list of things that you will not waste time in doing. This is the opposite to creating a ‘To-Do’ list, we all have certain things that we tend to do that do not actually add any value, for example those that smoke will tend to take 10-15min’s break going out for a fag. Imagine doing that 4 times a day for 15min’s each time, one whole hour wasted. Just think could you use that hour for something more beneficial.

Prophet Muhammad (PBUH) said - “There are two blessings which many people lose (They are) health and free time for doing good.” (Bukhari 8/421).

The Prophet (PBUH) used to make the following dua (prayer),

“O Allah! Make life a means for every dimension of goodness.”

Time management for many people can be daunting as we seek to balance the responsibilities for this dunya (world) and the responsibilities for akheera (life hereafter). Staying on target can get easily swept aside if we do not manage our time carefully.

It is important that one makes a list of those activities that they take part in during a day which is not real work, nor exercise time, prayer time, in other words non-productive or beneficial activity. Try to calculate how much time you spend doing those non-beneficial activities each day and see how much of your valuable time you are wasting on those things.

A friend of mine once said to me, that he does not have enough time in the day to do everything that is asked of him. So I asked him “Do you keep a to-do list?” His reply was “No”. I then sat down with him and created two lists, one for those activities that he considers important and another for the activities he does almost daily, but for which he has no clear indication of value.

Astonishingly what we found was that a large portion of his time during each day was being wasted on activities that did not add value, nor improve his life in anyway. This is where an ‘Eliminate Clutter list’ was very useful. At least you can use this list to identify and quantify the time that you may be losing daily on activities that are not benefiting you.

Give it a try and see if it works for you.