Why More People Don’t Commit to Personal Growth

You would think it would be common sense for people to want to make a commitment to personal growth and self-development. Just think of all the benefits that come to those who take the time to get to know themselves. These types are generally happier and know what they want out of life. Why don’t more people commit to this area of their lives and reap the benefits?

For one thing, it’s more than just common sense. There are a host of other factors that go into what holds a person back from exploring who they are as a person and overcoming the “life is hard” mentality to pursue whatever makes them happy in life. This article will look at a few of those factors:

1. Have you ever heard the phrase “live by faith”? This is normally heard in spiritual/religious circles, but everyone lives by faith in something. You have to have faith in the floor when you get out of bed and step onto it first thing in the morning. You live by faith every time you go out into the world, especially these days with all of the terrorism and shootings that you see on the news. What’s the opposite of living by faith? It is living in fear, which produces anxiety. Despite the anxiety, most people are afraid of themselves. Maybe they are afraid of the power they may yield when they fully become more in tune with who they are as a person.

2. It is also human nature to struggle with doubts. Another likely reason why people don’t make a commitment to learning psychology, which will help them understand themselves better, is because they don’t believe they can live a fuller, more abundant life. Human nature is trapped in negativity, and it is harder to break free. This is especially true if you experienced some form of abuse while you were growing up. 

3. Some people do not really want to overcome their problems. They just want to complain to someone. They may even crave the attention they get from those who do take the time to listen to them. Granted, this won’t last for long, because most people will eventually avoid someone who is chronically negative all the time. The world is built on energy and moves by it. If you are not proactive toward anything, you eventually get left behind, and people start to find reasons to not hang around you. 

4.   Life is really simple, but we humans tend to over-analyze situations, which serve to make them more complicated than they appear. Granted, living in a fast-paced, technological world does not help with this very much. We are trained to overanalyze, so we end up missing the obvious. Not only do we have to train our minds to be more positive, but we also have to train them to “keep it simple”.

5. It is also easier to resist change and stick with keeping things the same. Although, according to Einstein, this is the definition of insanity.  People tend to choose the path of least resistance, so they stick with whatever it easier (i.e., taking pills rather than committing to therapy).

6. They are too busy. When living in a fast-paced system, many people simply don’t have time to make changes in their lives for the better.  They always procrastinate and put it off until another day. Before you know it, many years have passed and they have made their current practice of negativity and self-defeating thoughts a lifestyle.  Also, they are dependent on medication now and feel so good that they don’t tend to think about processing through their emotions, so they can go on to live a fuller and richer life without having to be dependent on psychotropic drugs, which also make them dependent on insurance and can keep them trapped in a job they do not particularly like just for the insurance.

While life is basically simple, the reasons as to why we do what we do are often not so much.  If we were not emotionally nurtured growing up and never learned to process our emotions, then we will likely be very intense as we grow older.  This can cause us to put up walls and even a mental block when it comes to understanding psychology which leads to self-development and personal growth.  Also, it is hard to break free from habits, especially once we become comfortable with life the way it is, and we have brainwashed ourselves into believing that this is the way life is meant to be.