THE POWER OF SELF-ASSESSMENT AND REFLECTION
The Power of Self-Assessment and Reflection
LANIE DEPPE
DISCLAIMER: I in no way have mastered the above skills because in many ways they are that, skills. I relate skills to my daily world of athletics as something that you’ve deliberately practiced over time, an expertise in a sense. Only recently have I felt like I maybe, just maybe, I might be coming into my own and are at least starting to get a grasp or at least a sense of some things in life. So, in no way in this article am I saying that this is how you should go about your self assessment or how you should reflect. Only that these are some areas that have helped me at this point in my life.
I am an introvert and someone who is terrible how expressing into words anything that I’m feeling. I’ve failed miserably many times and each time I go inward as a way of it somehow being therapeutic. Over and over again I push people away who are trying to help because I’m the only one who can help myself. But yet every day I’m telling my athletes to do almost the exact opposite of everything I’ve been doing for over thirty years. Every year a new class comes in that need to be taught about life, how to navigate through not only the intricacies of their team and through wins and losses, but also how to be an adult. And one day after many years as almost living as an imposter it hit me: I actually don’t know what I’m talking about, I don’t even have the ability to reflect. And because I can’t reflect, I definitely don’t have any ability to make a self-assessment and figure out how to make situations nor myself better.
Now, as I said above, I’m a work in progress. I still have a long way to go and in a few years I may think differently than what I’m writing in this article. But to be able to narrow down these top five areas have helped me tremendously. They’ve helped me to cancel out the noise a little bit better and focus on me and my journey. So through years of reflection and self-assessment, these are the areas I focus on when living my life.
1. Sleep
This is number one for several reasons. One, it is one of life’s basic necessities. There is no you without it. And two, being in coaching and early morning sports for much of my life, it’s what makes or breaks me in the day. I know if I’m not giving myself the opportunity to have 9 hours of sleep each night, even if I don’t necessarily sleep the whole 9, I’m not cognitively alert or able to accomplish my day the way I need to. I can’t interact with people the way I need to, notice small details, am super irritable, or of course not have the amount of energy I need. I’ve been criticized for not living life for years, because for whatever reason our society views getting little sleep and walking around like zombies as a badge of honor. To them, my response is always that I just live a different kind of life.
2. How I Handle Stress/Feeling Overwhelmed
I’ve learned especially within the last few years of how much internalizing stress took a serious tole on my body. So much so that I actually had shingles when I was 30, yes only 30 years old. People laugh when I tell them shingles changed my life, but it really did. It made me really see what I was doing to myself by bottling everything up and not having an outlet for it. If there’s one thing people know about me, it’s that I love doing anything active. Lifting, cycling, hiking, climbing.. you name it. Doing things that I love, preferably in nature, is my number one outlet. I caught myself being active less and less when I felt overwhelmed. Creating that awareness and making that change has helped me immensely in life.
3. Not Taking Life Too Seriously/LIVING
This may be my hardest area of focus because it’s definitely not who I’ve been for the better part of my adulthood. I wouldn’t really ever go on vacation, try new things, see new places, or sit in a room of people I love and just laugh. Nope. I was so scared about not putting every ounce of effort into my career that I lost sight of putting every ounce of effort into myself. Everything had been so intense and serious for so many years that I didn’t even know it had happened. I had successfully lost myself. It’s only been through meeting some absolutely tremendous people in my life that I’ve really seen this fault in myself. With stripping away anything having to do with what I had to do, they made me so life for what it is. I laugh more. I visit people I love more. I try things I’ve never done before. Who knew I would have such a great time throwing axes?! Don’t get me wrong, it was incredibly uncomfortable for me and still is at times, putting myself out there. But without these great people in my life, I wouldn’t have actually seen this life.
4. The People I Surround Myself With
As you can tell from my last focus, people are everything to me. I know it probably sounds weird with telling you how much of an introvert I am, but that’s exactly the point. People have changed my life. People have helped me see things I could have never seen. People have helped me experience some of the most memorable times of my life. But having said all that, it wasn’t actually until I realized who I was based upon where I was/who I was around. It took me essentially taking inventory of who I spent most of my time with an who I was when I was around those people that made me see this. “You are who the 5 people you most spend your time around”. Couldn’t agree more.
5. But, why?
Ladies and gentlemen, the question of the century.. why? Why are you the way you are? Why do what you’re doing? What is the actual purpose behind any of this? What is your why? I used to answer all these questions with things like “Because…”, or “I’m supposed to”, or just get super defensive and mumble and storm off because I don’t really have a good answer. Can you imagine a life where you’re not really sure what your purpose is? Sure you can. I think a lot of us are actually living it. I think as a society we’re too afraid a lot of the time to question ourselves because it makes us vulnerable and show we may have a weakness. However, uncertainty is the root of all progress and growth. Not only is it normal but it’s an absolute necessity in order to truly grow. While I may not have known what my why was before, and even though I may have some insight to it now, it may change in the next year or two or ten. Right here, right now, my why is growth.
Phew, that was a lot. I want to thank you for sticking with me through all that. Each one of these that I write I learn a little bit more about myself. With this one, I learned I have a lot more to say than I thought. And would you look at that, reflection and self-assessment! As I said before, I am a work in progress. I mess up all the time. But being able to reflect and move forward with things is a skill that needs practice and repetition. Keep working and growing!