What Are Your Strengths and Weaknesses
“Everyone, regardless of ability or disability, has strengths and weaknesses. Know what yours are. Build on your strengths and find a way around your weaknesses.” -Brad Cohen
This article, What Are Your Strengths and Weaknesses, is step two in a series of articles I’m writing on the topic of creating a personal vision statement. In the previous one, How to Write Your Personal Vision Statement, I talked about how to get started.
The second step in creating a personal vision statement is to ask the question: What are your strengths and weaknesses?
To find out, first make a list of your strengths and skills and decide how they relate to what you want to do with your life. It’s time to get out the handy pen and paper again.
What are your strengths as a person? Write down everything you can think of. This will require another brainstorming session. Don’t judge yourself and don’t hold back because of uncertainty or insecurity.
Are you strong (physically or psychologically)? Stubborn? Independent? Are you a freethinker? Are you good at helping people get along? Are you highly intelligent? Empathetic? Incredibly organized? You have a list of strengths just like everyone else. Don’t stop with this list until you feel like you’ve covered them all.
Next, you’re going to do the same thing for your skills. List every skill you can think of that you have, in particular those that are related to the goals you identified in step one. What skills do you currently have that will help you get to those goals? How many of those are good to go and which ones need work?
Now, look at the list of goals once again. What are the strengths a person who reaches each of those goals must possess? Go down the list and evaluate them one by one. Take your time with this; don’t rush this process. When you’re done, do it again and write down the list of skills needed to accomplish these goals. Here’s a quote by Henry Ward Beecher, “Greatness lies not in being strong, but in the right use of strength.”
You may have already guessed what the next step is going to be. You’re going to compare the two lists you’ve created -the one of strengths and skills you already have versus those that you need to accomplish all of these goals you want to achieve.
The difference between the two is your weaknesses. These are things you need to work on if you’re going to make all of your goals a reality. Circle all of these weaknesses. Just know that your weaknesses don’t have to be a deal breaker. In Isaiah 41:10 God tells us, “Fear not, for I am with you; be not dismayed, for I am your God; I will strengthen you, I will help you…”
If you like, you can add working on or developing some or all of these weaknesses to your personal vision statement. You don’t have to do so, but if you don’t, you still need to keep the list handy because you will have to work on these things if you want to reach your goals.
When you’ve finished with this step, and answered the question, “What are your strengths and weaknesses?” you can set the lists you made aside -but keep them handy for later -and go on to the next step where we’ll go into discovering your core values.
Here are the rest of the articles in this series:
Writing a Personal Vision Statement for Your Life
11 Examples of Personal Vision Statements
How to Write Your Own Personal Vision Statement
Discovering Your Core Values: Finishing Your Personal Vision
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