Some of you just wet your pants and now want to kill me. That’s okay, I’m a big boy now. I’m supposed to be the Gen Y poster boy for personal development so why would I say such a horrible thing like that?

Like anything, it’s because that statement is true. Too much personal development is not good for you. Social media tells us we have to keep growing every minute of every day. I agree we need to keep growing, but you can overdo it.

Too much personal development makes you one of those over-achievers that can’t shut up for even five minutes about how much they’ve got done for the day.

At cocktail parties, they keep dropping in the lines about how hard they work and how awesome their hustle is. I switch off when I hear this sort of talk.

The world doesn’t necessarily need more personal development; what the world needs are:

1. More people prepared to give everything of themselves and get nothing in return
2. More people willing to help a brother or sister out when they are in need
3. More people to flip problems on their head and solve them in new ways
4. More people that are obsessed with teaching the art of love

Okay, the last one was a little soft for a bloke, but you always ask me for the truth and I’m going to give it to you like a cold shower at 4 am on a Monday morning when you are freezing your tits off.

Be present

Instead of overdosing on personal development, concentrate on being more present. You’re here some of the time, but when you do too much personal development, you are in your head a lot. That’s because too much personal development causes you to live in the future and become obsessed with progress.

How does Uncle Tim know all of this? I know all of this because what I’m describing is what I suffered from.

I was the guy that woke up at 4 am, wrote a bunch of inspiring articles, did some exercise, drank green juice and threw on a Tony Robbin’s audiobook. I still do a lot of these tasks now. The key is that I don’t overdo it anymore.

“Being obsessed with personal development causes this over-achieving disease that our younger generation seems to have become addicted to. You don’t need to hustle and work 10X every moment of the day”

These are great disciplines to have but they have been taken out of proportion to what really matters in life. I’d rather you got home from the office each day and looked at your significant other in the eyes and told them how you felt about them.

I’d rather you gave some of your time each day to come back to right now and know that this very breath you are taking in this moment will never come back again.

I’d rather you realized the beauty in now instead of being sold the dream that the beauty will be here tomorrow, or in a year when you achieve more than your next door neighbor, or brother or sister has achieved.

Love a bit

While we overdose on personal development, we take away time to love a bit. Loving what we have and loving other people is a commitment of time. Just saying I love you to someone once in your life and proving it once, is not enough.

For you to truly demonstrate the act of love, you need to allocate time to it. Love is one of the few currencies you have been given to spend, and to share. Having more love in your life is about giving more of it. It requires you to think outside of your own selfish wants and desires and focus on someone else’s.

Too much personal development is, in a way, a demonstration of one’s selfishness. When we overdose on personal development, we show the world we are in love with ourselves in an egotistical way. We show the world that all we care about is bettering ourselves and that we don’t have time to love.

As I’ve said already, personal development is phenomenal just don’t overdose on it like I did.

Get over yourself

I didn’t pump out 200 reps of bench press yesterday. I know I’m a freaking disappointment to the world aren’t I? How dare I be into personal development and do anything less than a Spartan workout before breakfast. How dare I not push my chest out and show all the progress I’ve achieved at the gym.

I got news for everyone who hasn’t heard this: no one cares about what you have achieved. What they care about is who you are becoming and what sort of a person you already are. Take your Fitbit’s and your apps that track your reps and put them where the sun doesn’t shine.

You and your amazing Instagram life are boring. We’re all peeping in at this life and asking “Yeah but what’s in it for me?”

That’s the real truth right there.

“All your progress means nothing if humankind doesn’t get to progress or benefit as well”

What can you replace too much personal development with?

For me, I’ve replaced too much personal development with asking myself the following life questions:

– What is the meaning of my life?
– Why do I do what I do?
– How can I give more and create more value for those around me?
– If all of this ended tomorrow, would I be proud of myself?
– How do I love more?

Questions like these lead to new pursuits and give you a new priority in your life. When you understand that you are only a small part of this universe and that you are designed to contribute something of significance, your perspective changes.

The one success tip I constantly seem to keep giving is that it’s not about you. Part of that statement is a reminder to myself not to get caught up in my own perceived awesomeness and I encourage you to see that advice in the same way.

So quit trying to outdo everyone because it’s killing your success and it’s done the same to me. Personal development is not a competition or a cult.

Personal development is designed to help you make little steps each day so you can: uncover your purpose, find more ways to give, be fulfilled in life and love more than you have ever loved before.

I want you to remember these truths the next time you overdose on personal development and find yourself bragging on social media about how much you love it!

If you want to increase your productivity and learn some more valuable life hacks, then join my private mailing list on timdenning.net