 I know in the past we've talked a lot about introspection and self-reflection, and today we're going to tell you exactly what that means and how it can help you. Welcome back and congratulations on taking one more step towards becoming one of the great leaders of tomorrow. In the past we've talked about self-reflection as a tool to help us in our leadership practice, but I don't think we've ever talked about how to do it effectively or why it's really all that important. So today I'm going to give you four tips for effective self-reflection to get your 2017 started off right, and stay tuned to the end because I'm going to give you a link that'll let you download our workbook to help you build your own leadership development plan. So to put it simply, introspection is our ability as humans to think about ourselves as sentient beings as part of the universe. It allows us to look at the universe around us and ask questions and learn more, and it allows us to think about what our purpose and place in the universe is, and this is one of the things that really sets human beings apart from the animals. Now one of the advantages to introspection is that like I said it allows us to question our placing universe, it helps us to desire more and to set goals and to learn more, and it also helps us to keep from repeating the mistakes we've made in the past over and over again. Introspection allows us to learn and to make better plans and do things better in the future. Now as human beings we all engage in self-reflection all the time, and sometimes it's productive and sometimes it's not, and it can be hard to trust ourselves if our self-reflection and our introspection is taking us in the right direction. So here are some tips you can use to develop confidence in your introspection practice to help you make the right decisions going forward. The environment we place ourselves in when we do introspection is critical to the quality of that introspection. Everyone's different, but most people are pretty well served by trying to do their self-reflective activities in a quiet place away from the noise of life where they won't be distracted. I know I find it really hard to stay focused on the questions I'm trying to answer and the critical thinking I'm trying to do myself if I'm being disturbed by a lot of outside influences. Another key to effective introspection is to block out time on our calendars to do it. As much as we all try to multitask the truth is human beings just aren't that good at multitasking. We're much better served with our thoughts and our insights if we can be alone with them and not be disturbed by other things going on or try to do a bunch of other tasks. Blocking out even five or ten minutes on your calendar a day or a week or however often you think is necessary to do introspective activities is going to be much more effective than trying to squeeze it in or do it at the same time you're doing something else. An important thing to recognize is that we're talking about self-reflection, and that means we need to develop a practice that works for us. What works for somebody else may not be effective for us as we do our own introspection practice. It's great to look at what other people do, it's great to take advice that others have given us, and I do that all the time, but what we really need to do is take the best of what other people offer us that works for us and use that to build our own practice that serves us well to give us the thoughts and insights we need to set our goals and move forward. The final tip I have for you today is that introspection isn't all about getting to the answers. Sometimes it's enough just to be with our thoughts and think about the questions that are important to our lives and not worry about trying to find the answers in that session. What's really important when it comes to introspection is to take the time, avoid the distractions, and spend some time letting our minds, bodies, and hearts ruminate on the things that are going on our lives and the questions that we have for ourselves. If the answers don't come to us right away, that's okay. They may come to us later in the day when we're thinking about something else, but the important thing is that we took the time to do the introspection and self-reflection without any distractions. If you found this helpful, please share it with a friend or co-worker. Please follow us on Facebook, LinkedIn, and Twitter, and if you use that link below, that'll get you hooked up with our workbook to help you develop your own leadership development plan. If you have any business or leadership questions, email us at info at EvilGeniusLeadership.com or hit us up on social media or even leave a question in the comments. Thanks for watching. I really appreciate it. And remember, the future is out there. Lead the way.