August 16, 2022

What to ask yourself afterwards

woman's silhouette drawn on green background and a big question mark

Do you learn from what just happened? Or do you lose the learning by beating yourself up for failing, or swimming in your success, or just ignoring your past experiences?

Constructively reflecting on your experience of events is arguably the only way you will ever grow and develop who you are, so you have a better experience of the future events in your life.

And I don’t mean just ‘big’ events. I also mean events like going to the supermarket, mowing the lawn, taking out the trash, reading a book. Do you do any of those ‘perfectly’ yet?

The habit of tweaking what you do, even by only a little bit, will permeate your life and over time improve it immeasurably. Think Kaizen, which is a combination of two Japanese words that together translate as ‘good change’ or ‘improvement’.

So, how do you reflect effectively?

What do you ask yourself?

Stop, reflect, and answer these three questions…

  1. What did I want to happen?
  2. What actually happened?
  3. What caused the gap – or What contributed to success?

    Note: You MUST start the answer to this question with “I did…” or “I did not…”

  4. What am I going do about it next time?

    Note: You MUST start the answer to this question with “I will…” or “I will not…”

Keep it short and simple, and stick to the questions. A long story is not required. Don’t be too soft on yourself, and don’t be too hard on yourself either.

You can also use these simple but powerful questions as a tool to coach others.

My best wishes, Paul

Paul Matthews

CEO and Founder of People Alchemy

share this article:

Leave a Reply

Your email address will not be published. Required fields are marked *

This site uses Akismet to reduce spam. Learn how your comment data is processed.

related posts

Labrador puppies on a lawn

Learning from puppies: Training is for life not just for Christmas

Training is often still just focused on the training event. But to generate impact we need to create capability and see ourselves as capability managers.

Read More
cat stretched out comfortably on a cat sofa

Do you already know the cure?

Everyone seems to be searching for the magic information that will make a big difference in their lives. The truth is… you already know.

Read More

Setting up learning for success

In the second of two articles on establishing successful learning, Paul Matthews examines collective responsibility

Read More

Setting expectations

Setting up learning for success – In part 1 of 2 practical articles on how to establish successful training programmes Paul focusses on setting expectations

Read More

search blog

Get your free weekly tip

You agree that we can keep a record of your details, and send you other occasional offers. See our Privacy Policy