Self-Improvement Won’t Make You Feel Better- But This Will
Ultimately, if we want to be happier, it is a transformation that we are seeking, not self-improvement.
Self-Improvement vs. Transformation
By Kelle Sparta
We’re all seeking more happiness. It’s the reason we read articles, take classes, attend retreats, buy books, sign up for coaching and energy healing, and a whole host of other services. We want to be happy. And the world has convinced us that if we can just find the RIGHT service, book, class, retreat, etc., then we will be happy.
But that’s the misconception in the world of spirituality and self-help. It’s this idea that the more we know, the more skills we have, the more “spiritual” we become, the happier we will be. This just isn’t true – take it from me, I’ve spent more than 40 years in the personal growth and spirituality world, and I’ve seen this happen to people over and over again. They dive in with both feet, learn as much as they can for anywhere from 2-20 years and then come up for air only to realize that they feel just the same on the inside as when they started.
Sure, they can do an amazing ritual, meditate for hours, have more crystals than anyone they know, and can-do asanas standing on their heads, but they aren’t happy. They are still either spending more and more time trying to leave their bodies to escape their lives, or they are just not happy.
What is needed is an understanding of the difference between self-improvement (skill-building and understanding the self) and transformation (becoming someone new). Self-improvement gives us better-relating skills and coping mechanisms. Transformation changes are the very nature of who we are. Each has its own benefits and downsides.
Self-Improvement
The process of understanding we at a deeper level is awesome. It helps us to see how we are acting in the world and how those behaviors create our realities. Building new skills and coping mechanisms are also good for changing the way we behave and, therefore, the way others respond to us. But this is all an external change. Inside we remain the same. We may feel slightly better because our new ways of behaving are getting us better responses, but the feelings that caused the poor behaviors are still present. And when those feelings get triggered, most of the skills we learned can be forgotten in an instant, leaving us to pick up the pieces when we have calmed down.
