
About About Us Contact Us Testimonials Legal Support Us Site Map Site Search What's Happening What's New Must Reads Most Popular Pages Must-read Books Our Products Must-read Books Bookshop Free Resources Tools and Techniques Articles Home

Personal Development Stories

Here's a useful goal setting tip. Reading personal development stories is one of the best ways to add wisdom, wit, vision, colour, and fun to your personal development plan. Whatever your goal, whether personal growth or formal career development, you'll benefit from reading these stories.

This is just one of our continuous improvement resources. We'll be adding to this collection of stories regularly, so subscribe to our RSS feed to ensure you don't miss our new entries. We're firm believers in the benefits of story-telling, so this is a page that will be changing frequently.

Go to the ROAR!

Lions love to eat gazelle meat; however, it is very difficult for them to catch gazelles because they run so fast. Instead, a group of young lions herd the gazelles away from them. The gazelles easily outrun the lions and head off in the direction the lions have chosen, which is unknowingly towards a deep grassy area where a group of older lions are hiding.

The older lions are too old and tired to be part of the chase; many are missing teeth, and would never be able to catch their own meat. When the gazelles are driven within close range of the older lions, they jump up and ROAR loudly.

Immediately, the gazelles, responding to their perceived fear of imminent death, turn and run in the opposite direction, right into the mouths of the young lions.

Personal Development Stories "The moral is that running from your fears and not facing them can often lead you into real danger and worse outcomes. In day-to-day life, the lions lying in wait may not be life threatening, but they are often false fears.

Running away may mean we remain stuck and unhappy for a long time or until we face and move through our fear."

We're not sure about the accuracy of the lion analogy. Especially as it's well known that in the lion kingdom, it's the females, the lionesses who do all the work! Nonetheless, we can't disagree with the moral. It's still one of our favourite personal development stories though!

Remember Jack Canfield's words in "The Success Principles: How to Get from Where You Are to Where You Want to Be". "If you keep doing what you've always done, you'll keep getting what you've always got."

And as Gail Sussman Miller says: "acknowledging and facing your fear may actually mean a better chance of survival. It is nearly *always* an opportunity to grow, learn, and improve your confidence and success. You increase your tolerance of risk and your ability to move through your fears better the next time."

Instead of acting instinctively, or from habit, think about your fears. Analyse them. Take steps to defeat them. Then go to the roar. Think of your fears as a challenge to be overcome, or a problem to be solved. The key to analysing any problem is to ask the right questions. Try combining these personal development stories with some of our tools, such as: Problem Solving Activity: A Question Checklist For Problem Solving.