How expanding your circle of awareness is an effective business exercise

How expanding your circle of awareness is an effective business exerciseHow expanding your circle of awareness is an effective business exerciseYou might be miserable at work because you dont know what makes youhappy.Hear me out. Professional self-awareness means knowing your own feelings and needs- knowing how you work best, what your goals are, and what accomplishments make you happiest. Listening to those needs and acting on them will make you feel more connected to the work you do every day.Follow Ladders on FlipboardFollow Ladders magazines on Flipboard covering Happiness, Productivity, Job Satisfaction, Neuroscience, and moreBut ignoring, or worse, glossing over them, can lead to misery.This happens to people constantly. Were taught from a young age to follow what others expect from us- listen to the teacher, parents, and babysitter. Then it becomes listen to the boss and we lose ourselves. We learn our wants and needs dont really matter. People end up working in situations the y hate but have no idea what theyd rather be doing. Theyve never taken time to ask themselves those crucial questions.Because few people realize they can follow their own passions.On the opposite end of the spectrum,in agile coaching, everything is done by invitation. We dont insist anyone listen to us, we ask them if they want to. So, when Im working with clients stuck in their own misery, its crucial I start with, What do you like? If their answer is, I dont know, we use that as our starting point. Together, we begin to build their self-awareness.Because being aware of your wants, needs, and desires willhelp you find genuine happinessat work, making you more engaged and productive in the long-term.But first, you have to know what actionable self-awareness looks likeIn their book,Emotional Intelligence 2.0, Travis Bradbury and Jean Greaves discuss the critical importance of having a high level of emotional understanding in the workplace.A low emotional intelligence, or EQ, could le ad to defensive behavior at work or getting chewed up by your own emotions. You may not understand why you feel a certain way, or why a working relationship isnt functioning well. All of that frustration and despair can build up and cause problems, such as snapping at coworkers, lashing out, or using anger to try and control a situation.A high EQ, on the other hand, helps you successfully manage your own emotions as well as your working relationships with success.Bradbury and Greaves break emotional intelligence into four categories. Successfully growing in each looks slightly different, but is equally crucial to your long-term happiness. For exampleInternal Self-AwarenessYou know how you feel. This is at the core of all other EQ tasks or skills- without it, you can accomplish little.Self-ManagementYou know how to manage your emotions and positively direct your behavior. You understand your mental and emotional needs for your work environment and know how to ask they be met by your employer.Social awarenessYou empathize easily with your coworkers and their needs. You are able to engage in conversations of varying intensities with a great degree of social grace.Relationship managementYou understand the emotions of your coworkers and how to work well with others in any given situation.Those all sound like attributes of a happy, well-rounded, emotionally adjusted coworker, right? But no one walks into a room fully self-aware and ready to roll.It takes hard work and a willingness to look closely at your own needsThe first step to developing an acute EQ and improved self-awareness is digging deep into your own self.For a lot of people, this is going to be uncomfortable- scary even. Remember weve all been trained to gloss over our own needs in favor of what were told to do and who were expected to follow. Suddenly ripping away that protective layer to follow your own direction is terrifying.To ease the fear, arm yourself with knowledge. Make your needs and happiness an exam you cant afford to fail- literally. Taking personality tests can help do more than kill time on a slow work day. Assessments like Meyers-Briggs and the Enneagram arent foolproof science, but they can provide insights into aspects of your personality you may miss on your own.For example, according to the Meyers-Briggs test, Im an ISFJ, also known asThe Defender. This means Im sensitive but analytical, reserved, but good with people. Essentially, Im just the right collection of letters to be an agile coach, but without knowing myself, I may have ended up on an entirely different career path.After youve done the work, take notes and have them readyA User Manual for managing you as an employee can be a huge asset both for your own self-awareness and your employer.And this doesnt have to be an actual full-on 50 page PDF. It can be one page with a few bullet points that address your work style, your values, your growing edge, etc.For example,my computer-nutzer manualtells my curr ent or future colleagues that I most value inner peace, stability, and openness, while also alerting them that when I am the most frustrated, I can lash out emotionally. Now, thats a seriously vulnerable thing to tell someone you work with. Fear of judgment may make people less likely to take a risk like that.But without taking risks, you cant grow. You cant create the best possible space for your own progress. And the whole point of developing self-awareness is to do better for yourself. The more you understand yourself, the better chance you have of being in situations where you can thrive- with or without a user manual.This article first appeared on Minutes.