TL;DR [SELF REFLECTION QUESTIONS]: I believe in order to grow, you need to sit down and spend a good amount of time assessing what patterns, mindsets, behaviors, habits, relationships, and routines are impacting the way you live right now. That way, you can move forward knowing what parts of yourself need improving — and there’s no better way to do that besides asking yourself some self reflection questions.
Are you trying to reflect on yourself, but have no idea what the heck to ask?
Don’t worry, friend! I’ve got you! Self reflection is an essential process in becoming a better person because it allows you to think about the things that have shaped who you currently are, and make better decisions for the future. It’s important that you don’t skip this step, no matter how boring or cringy it seems.
If you’re just starting your personal growth journey, I’m going to give you 87 self reflection questions that’ll help you grow. I asked myself all of these, and they gave me a good sense of direction.
Are you ready, Star? Let’s do this!
This post is all about self reflection questions.
What is self reflection, and why is it important?
Self reflection (AKA introspection) is reflecting on different experiences in your life, along with the state of your mental health. Introspection is key to self-growth because it allows you to reflect on your past and current self, and make improvements based on them.
Ideally, self reflection should be something you do throughout your entire life. Even though you’ll never be the BEST version of yourself (if you didn’t already know that, now you know!), you should always strive to become a betterversion. We’re ever-changing, and introspection is essential to personal growth.
Alright, now that we’ve covered the basics, it’s time to get into these self reflection questions. You can answer as many or as few as you’d like — it’s your self-growth journey!
Whether you answer them in a journal, in your notes app, or even on a sheet of paper, this process will be super helpful.
Self Reflection Techniques & Exercises:
Before we get to the good stuff, I wanted to share some of the most effective self reflection techniques and exercises. You can either use one of the 87 questions as a starting point or do it your own way!
- Journaling | you already know how I feel about journaling, so I’m gonna keep this short and sweet. Journaling is arguably the best way to self reflect because you’re basically writing while you’re reflecting, and that combo is indescribably powerful.
- Life Audit | if you didn’t know, a life audit is a self reflection technique where you assess every aspect of your life: your mental health, finances, career, physical health, and relationships. This technique takes a bit longer since it’s so deep and introspective, but I PROMISE it’ll give you a good sense of direction.
- Future Self Letter | sending your future self a letter is so effective because you’re communicating directly with them. You get to put on your “future glasses,” hop in a time machine, and talk to your future self.
- Core Values | the classic core values exercise makes you think about what your values are, and act accordingly.
- Legacy Question | the legacy question is, as you’d expect, a question about your legacy. It’s so impactful because it makes you think about what legacy you want to leave, and change your habits and goals to make sure you’re on track to leave that legacy.
- Stop-Start-Continue Method | with this method, you’re outlining a few things in your life that you’d like to stop, start, and continue doing. In my opinion, this is one of the best, most effective self reflection exercises, as it’s more well-rounded rather than being laser-focused on one thing about yourself.
- Sit-and-Think Method | okay, I may have made this one up, but just roll with it! With this method, you simply sit and think about yourself. Think about the person you used to be, the person you are right now, and the person you want to become.
If you need further explanation or examples, I’ll be writing individual posts on all of these techniques and exercises. Stay on the lookout for them!
87 Self Reflection Questions for Personal Growth:
These are 87 self reflection questions to help you grow. With each one, I want you to stop and think deeply. I’m breaking them up into past, present, and future questions to give you a more well-rounded growth exercise.
Questions About the Past:
- Would younger me be proud of me today? How so?
- What is one thing I always wanted to do, but was afraid of doing? Why was I afraid? Am I still afraid? What can I do to get over that fear?
- If I could go back and change one thing from the past, what would it be? How will that affect my future? Will it align with my goals and core values?
- What’s something I regret from my past? Why did I do it? Was it more of an impulsive decision or was it planned? Why do I regret it, and how could I live differently moving forward? What lesson did I learn from it?
- What’s the best decision I’ve ever made? How did I make that decision? Why is it the best decision I’ve made?
- What’s the worst decision I’ve ever made? How did I make that decision? Why is it the worst decision I’ve made?
- What goals did I set 5 years ago? Have I accomplished any of them yet? In what ways do those goals align with the person I wanted to be at the time? How do they align with me now?
- What goals did I set last year? Have I accomplished any of them yet? If so, what were the steps I took to do so? If not, are those goals still relevant, and what can I do to start working on them?
- Recall a time someone said something that genuinely hurt your feelings and made you question yourself over and over again. Why did that specific comment hurt you, and what’ve you done to heal? Have you healed?
- What lessons have I learned from the people around me?
- When was the last time I felt genuinely happy? Who or what made me feel that way?
- When was the last time I did a good deed for someone? How did that make them feel? How did it make me feel?
- What’s a toxic habit or mindset that I used to have, but have grown from? What inspired that growth?
Questions About the Present:
- What kind of person do I want to be? What qualities, skills, habits, and mindsets do they have? What can I do to start working toward becoming that person?
- Do my actions match my words? Do I typically follow through with my aspirations and plans?
- What is prohibiting me from reaching the success that I wish to accomplish?
- How does my life look right now? What are some things I want to change? What are some things that I’d like to keep the same?
- What is the number one time-consumer in my life right now? Is it worth all the time, or do I need to make some changes? How would I use my time differently if I removed this from my life?
- Do I have more of a pessimistic (negative, realistic, and closed-minded) or optimistic (positive, hopeful, and open-minded) mindset? How does this affect my daily life?
- List some of the positive habits you have right now. How can you expand on them?
- List some of the negative habits you have right now. How can you replace them with positive ones?
- Feel free to write about anything you’d like to write about.
- Respond to a journal prompt.
- How do I respond to conflict?
- Who’s the first person I call when I have good news to share?
- In general, how do I take care of myself? Do I take care of myself?
- What patterns do I notice about myself?
- Would you date yourself? Would you be friends with yourself? Would you be your own sibling?
- What kinds of people do I usually attract in my life? Why?
- What goals do I have right now? Have I started working on any of them yet? If so, how is that progress looking?
- Do I stay true to my word? Do I actually do the things I say I’m going to do?
- If there was one thing I could change about my job, what would it be? Why?
- What do I do when I’m sad?
- What do I do when I’m angry?
- What do I do when I feel hurt?
- What do I do when I’m excited?
- What do I do when I feel hopeful?
- What do I do when I feel on top of the world?
- What do I do when I feel misunderstood?
- What do I do when I feel mistreated?
- What do I do when I feel invisible?
- What do I do when I feel stuck?
- What do I do when I feel clueless?
- What do I do when I feel directionless?
- When do I eel the most alive?
- How do I feel when I step out my comfort zone?
- What is the #1 thing holding me back from flourishing? How can I work on destroying or moving past that road block?
- How much physical activity do I get each day?
- Do I get all the nutrients I need each day?
- What’s my favorite way to communicate? Why?
- Do I genuinely like my job, or do I just tolerate it?
- What do I think about regret?
- Do I speak to myself with positivity and care?
- Do I spend my money with intention, or just blow it on whatever I want?
- If I had an extra $1,000 on my next paycheck, what would I do with it?
- If I had unlimited money, what would I do with it?
- What boundaries, if any, do I have? What do I do when someone crosses them? Which ones do I still need to establish and enforce?
- Name the most influential person in your life. In what ways do they influence you, either positively or negatively?
- What do I spend my free time doing?
- Am I more of an introvert, extrovert, or ambivert? Why?
- Do I know how to enjoy being alone? Do I know what it really means to be alone?
- Name the habit you’re most proud of. How did you form it? Why did you form it?
- Name the habit you’re least proud of it. How did you form it? Why did you form it?
- Do I receive the same amount of love, care, and consideration that I pour into others?
- Do I tend to express my emotions, or hold them in?
- Do I trust my intuition? When was the last time I trusted my intuition and it was right? What happened the last time it was wrong?
- Do I tend to act on impulse or follow a structured plan?
- What’s the strongest relationship in my life right now? What about it makes it so strong, and how can I make sure to keep it that way?
- Who am I when nobody’s watching?
- What’s something I can’t tell a single soul? What’s my deepest, darkest secret?
- What are my values? What do I do when someone tries to go against them?
- When I feel overworked, do I take a break, or do I try to finish everything in one sitting?
- Who do I need to forgive? How am I going to feel when I forgive them? How will they feel when I forgive them? Why haven’t I forgiven them yet? How am I going to approach the conversation when it finally happens?
- Am I closer to my mother or my father? Why?
- In what ways do I subtly change myself depending on who I’m around? Do I make these changes on purpose, or naturally?
- What parts of myself do I keep shrinking to keep others big?
- What’s something I’m devoted to? What am I so passionate about that I can’t live without it?
Questions About the Future:
- What can I do today to make future me, happy?
- If it all ended tomorrow, how would I feel? Would I be proud of my accomplishments?
- Where do I want to be in 5 years? What things am I doing right now to reach that version of myself?
- If I had an extra 5 hours each day, how would I use that time?
- More than anything, what do I long for? What do I desperately wish I had?
- Where do I want to travel in the next five years? What about these destinations is so special? What lessons can I learn from visiting them?
- If I could move to any city in the world, where would I move? Why?
- If I could have any profession I wanted, which one would I choose? Why?
- What kinds of people do I want to attract in the future? What qualities about those people are worth attracting?
- Recall a time you were the reason a relationship ended. What did you do, and how can you prevent that from happening again?
Recap
And with that, we’re done! In this post, I shared with you some of my favorite, most introspective self reflection prompts to help you in your personal growth journey.
Whether you’re thinking in the past, present, or future, there’s numerous prompts for any time period you want to write about and reflect on.
Time to Take Action
Now it’s time to take action. I want you to go back and skim through some of the questions and choose one to answer. Ideally, you’ll answer all of them eventually, but for now, just stick with one.
The most effective way to answer any of these questions is by writing them on a piece of paper, so grab a pencil and some paper, and get to writing! Don’t worry about time — just keep writing until your soul tells you to stop. When you’re done, ask yourself how it felt and what you’re going to do with the entry.
If you want, share the question you picked in the comments. I’d love to see what you chose to write about!
Until next time, keep shining, Star — one day at a time.
