Gaining Personal Awareness

Gaining Personal Awareness

When attending therapy sessions, one of the first and most important skills you will learn is personal awareness. Personal awareness is the ability to understand who you are, including your values, thoughts, emotions feelings, and spirituality. It is the ability to understand how you react and live in the world.

Personal awareness is vital in individual counseling

Personal awareness is important because there is only one person you can control in your relationships and in life. That person is you. I have often heard the following statement in therapy. If you fix him or her, then everything will be alright in your relationship. Sometimes, I have heard another statement. “I only do this action because someone else did this action to me.” The problem in each of these cases is that we have given our personal responsibility and power over to someone else. We have stated that this person, the party that has offended or hurt me, can control my emotions and my reactions.

Personal awareness is present in all areas

Maybe your spouse is not sharing in the responsibilities of the home. Maybe your children are not living up to your expectations or you feel mistreated on your job. All of these situations are valid. Yet, the powerful thing about personal awareness is that it allows us to recognize that we have the ability to control our responses to these actions.

Personal awareness is the first step in regaining our power because we become aware of how we react to certain situations. Once we understand where our reactions come from, we can begin the process of change so we can act out of power and awareness instead of reacting out of pain, fear, and anger. 

Here are some steps we can use to create personal awareness:

1. Track how many times this week you are sad, angry, happy, and so forth
2. Write these dates and times down.
3. After you do this for a week, then begin to examine what is going on. Whether it’s your thoughts or an event that created a certain reaction, keep track of those thoughts and events.
4. Reflect back on those events and think about how you might act differently.
5. If a certain emotion comes up over and over again, especially from similar thoughts or events, then recognize you might be dealing with an emotional wound. Understand that all of us have emotional wounds.
6. Seek out counseling to assist in dealing with the emotional wounds. When we treat our wounds, they no longer trigger automatic reactions but instead allow us to create conscious actions that lead us to become better people.
7. Understand this is a process. As we work the process, we become more empowered as individuals and more empowered in our relationships.

Begin Counseling in Atlanta, GA with Faith and Family Empowerment

Individual counseling in Atlanta, GA can help you to gain personal awareness so that you can enter situations with a different mindset. Currently, we are seeing our clients through online therapy in Georgia while our Atlanta-based counseling practice is closed. When you’re ready to begin individual counseling, follow these steps:

1. Fill out an online appointment request. 
2. Get to know our team of counselors. 
3. Begin to navigate your anxiety in a helpful way.

Other Related Services

• Online therapy
• Depression counseling
• Grief Counseling
• Relationship Therapy for One
• Marriage counseling
• Online Support Group
• Depression Support Group 
• Anxiety Support Group