It is normal and relatively frequent that people seek to improve themselves and their way of being. However, on some occasions the change sought is very deep, structural. Is it possible to become a very different person from what one has always been?

In this article we will see some tips and recommendations about how to change your personality by introducing different habits into your day-to-day life .

How to change your personality

Personality is by definition something that is maintained over time, which tends to be constant. Specifically, it is the set of psychological dispositions that orient us towards certain behavioural dynamics and not others, and it is based on a genetic component and a learned one, which is born from experience.

However, as with most psychological phenomena, personality is not an element imposed on us in a deterministic way , but we can influence it in surprising ways. It is practically impossible to turn it around and become something in which we do not notice anything of what we once were, but radical changes are possible with effort and time.

So, to change your personality follow these tips.

Specify your objectives

The goal of “changing my personality” is too abstract, too ambiguous. If you don’t divide it into different specific objectives, you will get lost in vagueness and will not make significant progress .

So, write down on a piece of paper what aspects of your way of being you would like to change, filtering out priorities, and focus on them. In the end, it is absurd to propose to change completely in all aspects of your personality; you have to aim at those areas that give you problems or are perceived as weaknesses.

2. Create commitment

Whenever we set ourselves an ambitious goal that requires effort, it is good to make sure that we are fully committed to it. One way to do this is to talk about it with others, so that we can create expectations and have more reasons not to give up.

Generating this kind of self-obligation is very positive for reaching goals and not throwing in the towel, even though it seems to limit our freedom.

3. Distance yourself from your previous failures

In many cases, one of the obstacles that make it difficult for someone to change their personality for the better is the fact that they fall into the trap of believing that they will fall again and again into the kind of failures they fell into in the past.

It is true that we all have weaknesses that characterize us, but that does not mean that we cannot arm ourselves against these kinds of mistakes. With enough effort and learning, we can develop extraordinary skills . Even if we don’t, this simple thought helps us to stop being afraid of those aspects of life that have never been given to us in a good way, which serves to make us stop being so vulnerable to them.

4. Renunciation of what they will say

Your changes in personal development should only concern you. Of course, people always have reason to talk behind your back and criticize, but that’s precisely why what others think shouldn’t obsess us; no one knows us as well as we know ourselves, and that’s why the vast majority of moral judgments and assessments we receive from others are worthless.

Being aware of this, and of the fact that everyone has the same weaknesses for which we ourselves are capable of hating ourselves at certain times, helps to put things in perspective and to not feel condemned to be always the same : around us people change radically for good and for bad, and you can do the same. The point is to guide this change so that it is for the better.

5. Surround yourself with people who inspire you

Much learning happens spontaneously by simply surrounding ourselves with those who give us reason to improve and content to work on to become better.

If we avoid falling into the trap of constantly comparing ourselves with those we consider to be the best, we will start to absorb and adapt to our way of being those elements that we consider to be positive : to have more patience, to learn to listen and to put ourselves in the shoes of others, to be more creative by not discarding the most outlandish ideas, etc.

6. Don’t assume your own identity, modify what you already have

It is important not to cover ourselves with tics that define the personality of others, but to develop our own version of what we want to become. For example, if we want to work on our self-esteem in order to have more confidence in our abilities, we should not use someone else’s expressions or body language in an imposed manner, but rather look at what we usually do and make corrections.

Fixing on oneself is an indispensable element to change one’s personality , since one has to work with what one has; showing that we are a blank sheet of paper will only generate frustration.

7. Introducing small changes in daily life

Take time each day to look at what you’re doing and correct it on the fly in order to move towards your desired goal. The rest of the day, don’t worry about it. This way, you will work intensively, while you will not have to exert yourself later on and you will be able to recover (which avoids stressing too much).

Little by little, the repetition of those moments in which you strive for change will make them automatic , and you will be able to gradually extend the time window you devote to developing an improved personality.

8. He has the help of psychologists

If necessary, psychologists can help you through psychotherapy. Professional accompaniment is usually very useful to find new strategies for improvement and to detect errors that had gone unnoticed.

Bibliographic references:

  • Corr, Philip J.; Matthews, Gerald (2009). The Cambridge handbook of personality psychology (1. publ. ed.). Cambridge, U.K.: Cambridge University Press.
  • González, José (1987). Personality psychology. Madrid: Biblioteca Nueva.