Family, environment, school, of course, play a big role in shaping personality. However, self-education is also of great importance. This is practically the only way to make adjustments to a person’s character in a certain life period. If before the age of four a child adopts a demeanor, learns social skills from adults, then already a younger student and, especially, a teenager becomes much more resistant to any outside influences. For young people, self-education is an exclusive means of personal development. How is it carried out and how to direct the young soul in the "right direction"?
Don't think that self-education is some kind of special special occupation that takes a lot of time and effort. No, most often it happens gradually, as if imperceptibly. These are not only purposeful volitional efforts of a person who wants, for example, to develop attention, memory, become more hardened or acquire physical strength. Of course, playing sports, training, self-study are ways to work on yourself.
However, self-education is also about reading books, and internal dialogues (often in the form of diaries or blogs), and talking to smart people who can teach something good. People are not born with values. Self-education of a person is imperceptibly carried out both when watching high-quality meaningful films, and when formulating and expressing, and then defending one's point of view - for example, within the framework of discussions and disputes. For each of us, "getting better" means completely different things. For one, it is to develop muscles, endurance, physical strength, speed. For another - to learn to be kinder and more tolerant. For the third, historical and heroic examples of self-education are of the greatest importance. First of all - strong-willed hardening. Alexey Meresyev or Nikolay Ostrovsky can serve as examples. For many, the model of great will is Napoleon Bonaparte. For others - Mikhail Lomonosov, like other outstanding self-taught. But for Leo Tolstoy or Anton Chekhov, self-education consisted in developing genuine humanism in oneself - sympathy, tact, participation. It is no accident that so much attention is paid to moral issues in their works. Diaries and letters clearly show the inner work of writers on themselves. F. M. Dostoevsky also described the fight against vice - gambling addiction or passion for gambling, and the author himself was the prototype of the hero.
It is believed that in addition to introspection and self-hypnosis, auto-training and the method of empathy are excellent ways of educating a personality, whichis to put yourself in the place of another person, to imagine how you would feel or think in such a situation. Rewards are also an important element. For example, if you managed to fulfill your plan, achieve your goal (which must be formulated, spoken out loud), then you can make yourself a small gift. Self-criticism does not bring the desired results for everyone, although without it it is difficult to identify the shortcomings that a person considers it necessary to work on. At the same time, she should not turn into self-flagellation, which is a deviation from normal behavior.
