Awareness of personal preference
This is an interesting personal exercise which highlights another aspect of self-hypnosis which can be valuable in ways which are unsurprised you. Used also by behavioral scientists, the procedure may one day contribute to a reduction in the large percentage of people who fail to find fulfillment in their work. At a purely personal level, what you will learn will greatly increase your overall effectiveness. The simple requirement is to prepare a shortlist of your personal likes and dislikes as far as the habit, characteristics or personalities of other people are concerned: what do you admire and appreciate in others, what do you dislike or abominate.
You will require a sheet of paper or you may choose to use the fly-leaf of this book. Draw a line down the middle of the page and head the first half ‘LIKES’ and the second ‘DISLIKES’ List only three of each. At a later stage you may find it useful to expand on the initial list. There like and dislike are sufficient to demonstrate the technique: quality of content rather than quantity.
Think carefully of the kind of personality or character you tend to admire and then the kind that you normally would choose to forget.
In three short descriptive sentences, job down your three preferences, roughly in order of importance to you. Be brief, clear, specific.
Now list in order of impact the three trains that you heartily detest in people. Don’t be shy about it, everyone has a right to a personal opinion. Now is an opportunity to state it clearly for yourself, briefly but to point. To facilitate later review, the following is provided as an example of the form your comments should take:
‘LIKE: People who show appreciation of work well done’.
‘DISLIKE: People who only think of themselves’.
Be sure about your choices. The more thought you put into phrasing them clearly, the more benefit you will drive from the subsequent comparison.
If you use a sheet of paper, you may wish to safeguard it or retain it as a bookmark until a later stage. Don’t mislay it. Some further exercises are required before we can revert to the subject to see how it can be developed to be of real practical value.
Do the exercise, don’t just think about it. You may liken it to a method used in language training or elocution. An excellent way of becoming aware of the improvement in your pronunciation is in listening to your initial recording at a later date. This gives you a boost in confidence which is invaluable in accelerating your continued progress. You will no be disappointed: the better you apply yourself to the task, the better the results.
Stress check. Relax.