If you were to asked to rate yourself on how self-aware you are on a scale of one to 10 (one being completely lacking in self-awareness and 10 being fully self-aware), how would you score?

Like most, you would give yourself a modest, yet still respectable six. Maybe a solid seven? Or an eight if you’ve embarked recently on a self-improvement crusade.

Self-awareness is the ability to see oneself truthfully and honestly. This includes recognising your personality traits, the motivations for your actions, habits, interests, and acknowledging how you are perceived by those around you.

Most importantly, self-awareness helps clarify your limitations and obligations to those you share your life with.

Self-help gurus, coaches and psychologists advocate the importance of self-awareness. Feel-good movies starring inspirational protagonists overcoming personal hurdles revolve around themes of “being true to oneself”.

People are told that being sincere to who they are enables them to become who they wish to be.

As early as 320 BC, the Greeks inscribed onto the walls of the Temple of Apollo in Delphi a phrase that translates simply to “know thyself”.

This maxim – a proverb that holds general truth and wisdom, remains a popular and relatable expression in modern-day personal development efforts. The maxim encourages introspection and self-reflection as ways to enhance self-awareness.

To be emotionally intelligent, for instance, you are asked to start by labelling your feelings and the triggers of your emotional states.

For all the “success” of the self-help industry today (an industry worth US$9.9 billion in the US alone at the time of writing), you’re still no less anxious or pessimistic about your personal growth and development.

Mid- and quarter-life crises are still prevalent, and the World Health Organisation projects that rates of depression are expected to rise in coming years.

There is no single prescription that guarantees health, well-being and success, nor is there a single cause for this decline in mental health.

But if you have tried to chart your paths for personal improvement by starting within yourself and are still failing, you need to ask an important question: Are you going about enhancing your self-awareness in the wrong way?

Blinded by unawareness

Perhaps people are not as self-aware as they think – a point highlighted by organisational psychologist Tasha Eurich in her book “Insight”.

Eurich points to an unexpected finding in her large-scale study of self-awareness to back her claim.

Her research team expected self-aware individuals – those who regularly engaged in reflections of their thoughts and feelings to be happy and fulfilled in their lives.

Instead, the research team found the opposite: people who engaged in more introspection reported greater levels of stress and depression, and were more dissatisfied with their jobs and felt less in control of their lives.

These counter-intuitive findings would lead Eurich to question how valuable introspection is in influencing people’s lives.

In her TED talk, Eurich distinguishes between two kinds of people: those who think they are self-aware, and those who really are.

Eurich estimates that just 15% of people are authentically self-aware, highlighting how poor people can be at introspection and self-reflection.

She concludes with the statement that: “On a good day, 80% of us are lying to ourselves about whether we are lying to ourselves.”

Recall the score of one-10 you gave yourself on self-awareness at the start of this article. Would you now change your score?

Which of these two categories do you really think you belong to now? Many people engage in self-reflective practices thinking that it is benefitting their personal growth and development. But many are, quite simply, doing it wrong.

Cognitive biases

Cultivating self-awareness is important but you must recognise the many cognitive biases – deviations in thinking that hinder you from well-reasoned and justified self-assessments.

When you don’t know what you don’t know about yourself, it is impossible to be truly self-aware.

Self-serving bias

The self-serving bias occurs when you attribute past successes to personal attributes, while your failures are caused by external forces.

David McCraney, author of “You are Not so Smart”, explains that this bias occurs when “you excuse your failures and see yourself as more successful, intelligent, and more skilled than you are”. Brutal, but honest and true for most of us.

Competitive corporate environments value confidence, assurance and assertiveness as indications of ability and success potential. The modern-day workplace is oftentimes unforgiving towards failures and mistakes.

For that reason, self-serving bias is an important self-preservation function – safeguarding your status and reputation in the eyes of others.

Indeed, the self-serving bias is meant precisely for that – preservation of self-esteem and self-worth.

Psychologist Robert Trivers argues that the tendency to selectively and inaccurately attribute successes to your skills, talents, charisma and dashing appearance serves a self-deception benefit.

You believe the lies you tell ourselves so that you can better lie to others. Self-deception, as a bias, has been beneficial to people, as it was for your ancestors – enhancing survival and acceptance by social groups.

Who hasn’t realised or encountered (or heard stories of) bosses who hoard the credit for a successful project while blaming their team for an unsuccessful one?

And who hasn’t shifted the blame to their colleagues or bosses to protect their ego for a failing project or assignment you know you were personally responsible for?

Keep an eye out for Part 2 coming soon.

This article first appeared in jobstore.com

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