Growing as a person, whether that means as an individual, a parent, a friend, or a professional, requires correctly diagnosing your deficiencies, being humble enough to accept them, and being determined enough to improve them.
There is only so much time in the day for self-improvement, but there are certain areas that deserve more attention than others. With that in mind, below are four competencies to work on in 2021
Financial Management
Financial management and financial literacy are two areas where most people could stand to improve considerably. There are several aspects to good financial management, including financial planning, budgeting, understanding money and credit, and setting financial goals. This last component is particularly important because you need to know where you are going in order to understand the steps to take to get there. You might want to set a financial goal in order to make a major purchase, start a business, pay down debt, or simply so that you have more money saved for a rainy day.
The other facets of financial management are also extremely important. Knowing how and where to deploy your money, when and when not to apply for and use credit and how to create and stick to a budget are all essential parts of good financial health. After two chaotic and financially stressful years, the rest of 2021 is a good time to start improving your knowledge of personal finance and financial management.
Gmail
Gmail is a deceptively complex and highly useful tool that most people don’t exploit to anywhere near its full potential. Sure, Gmail is where you send and receive your email communication, but it is also a calendar, a marketing tool, and contains many other features that, when used correctly, can make your life so much easier. Features like “schedule send,” which let you prepare emails in advance of the date on which you would like to send them, are indispensable to working people, and especially business owners and leaders. Other immensely helpful features include “starring” and “snoozing” emails so that you can make sure you don’t lose track of the most important messages.
Improving your ability to use Gmail’s search function so that you can quickly locate emails from far in the past, using date range filters, is another Gmail competency to add to your list. As is creating inbox filters that automatically guide new emails to the correct folders so that you avoid clutter and stay better organized.
Time Management
Time management is something most people wish they were better at, and there are things you can start doing today to build habits that will help you make better use of your time. In today’s digital world, one of the biggest impediments to good time management is the urge or temptation to multitask.
Focusing on one thing at a time, however, is actually a much better way to ensure you get things done quicker. Going back and forth between tasks makes it much easier to get into the flow state–which is where you need to be if you are to maximize productivity and get things done.
Stress Management
Stress management tends to be overlooked as a competency to fortify and build on, but it is of the utmost importance. Everyone deals with stress in their daily life, some more so than others, but it is the ability to manage and diffuse it that makes the difference. There are plenty of strategies you can use to manage stress, including techniques like framing, as well as simply improving your planning so that tasks and responsibilities don’t add up and overwhelm you.
You can also do things like practice mindfulness, be kinder to and more forgiving of yourself, and work on improving your self-talk so that you are able to talk yourself through stressful situations and, importantly, out of catastrophizing when things get to be too much.
Conclusion
There are plenty of worthwhile competencies to build in in 2021, but they require both will and humility. From being a better manager of your own finances to making better use of Gmail, from time management to stress management, keep the above tips and recommendations in mind and improve your ability to run and handle your life.