We all have Issues!
Dealing with Your Character Flaws

A physical or psychological limitation that hinders our personal growth or social functionality, an annoying little quirk, an imperfection, a recurring problem, a phobia or a deficiency, an addiction to shopping, gambling, alcohol or drugs – these can be classified as character flaws and are present in various degrees in the human condition. We may think that the other person is always the one who has the problem, but if we are true to ourselves, we will all be able to identify one or more of these issues in our lives whether minor or more serious.

While a thorough understanding of this subject matter requires much more space than can be devoted here in this short article, at least we can delve into a brief tour of character flaws and come to some kind of understanding of the issues and needed pathways for growth and understanding.

No matter where you look, you will see some of the most obvious character flaws displayed in those around you and many times, right out in the open for all to see.

• A neighbor who is constantly drunk and yelling at his kids.
• The grocer who almost never responds to a “Good morning” greeting.
• A much-loved relative who’s afraid of heights.
• Your boyfriend who is afraid of commitment.
• A friend who is habitually late for important meetings and engagements.
• A co-worker who places blame on everyone else and never owns-up to a mistake of his own.
• A parent who cannot be honest with others and even themselves.

So how do we react when we’re faced with individuals with character flaws that really irritate us and sometimes drive us crazy? And what about our own issues? Are we attempting to understand and deal with them? What if we are in a state of denial so deep that you don’t realize how we negatively affect others in our circle of interpersonal relationships? The cliché “nobody’s perfect” is indisputably true and a prerequisite to being human – but what if we are unable to look at ourselves honestly and intently and deal with our own personal imperfections?

Remember, one of the keys to building a strong, long-lasting and intimate relationship with someone is learning to first admit our own character flaws and do our best to confront and work on them.

Of course, we don’t want to ever hate ourselves because of our inperfections; after all, how’s perfect? We can’t all measure-up to an unrealistic standard of perfection set by society and the world around us. We all have ingrained aspects of insecurities, some about our appearance and others ingrained from our childhood, extreme trauma or everyday hurt and pain experienced in the living of life. Some issues are more difficult to deal with than others. But, we must first accept ourselves as not unrealistically-perfect, but rather working toward a path of growth and improvement.

There a saying that goes something like this: we cannot share our love with others unless we start loving ourselves first. If we don’t love ourselves, how can we give away something you don’t have? This is why it’s important to learn to forgive ourselves for the mistakes we’ve made and the character flaws we may have. In integrating all of this, it’s important to remember that each one of us is a special and unique creature with individual talents that set us apart from others. This self-acceptance, combined with a realization that we need to work on our issues in an attitude of growth and self-confrontation, is an important approach toward having the confidence to participate in the dating world, have solid, long-lasting relationships and necessary for building rich interpersonal relations with others.

What are the Different Types of Character Flaws?

Before delving deeper into the many ways that we can deal with our own character flaws, it is good to first understand the different types of issues found in people.

Minor Character Flaws

A minor character flaw can be roughly defined as the odd little quirks in our personality or sensitivities about our appearance or intelligence level. For example, we may consider baldness, which is a certain uncontrollable aspect of our physical appearance, to be a minor obstacle contributing to a character flaw in our personality. This physical insecurity may cause us to be more reserved and not as outgoing as someone with a full head of hair, thereby having a certain amount of control on our emotional life. But an otherwise minor character flaw can also grow to be a major issue. .For instance, if our baldness would cause us to be entirely antisocial to the point of not being able to get a job or function in society then it has definitely graduated to a major character flaw.

Basically, minor character flaws have a smaller effect on our lives or the lives or the people around us, but they are considered, in most circles of society, to be an imperfection and not something rendering debilitating control of our lives. Yet these imperfections can grow quickly out of control in extreme cases when they have a permanent, negative effect on our lives and on the lives of those around us. Some examples of minor flaws are given below:

• Habitual lateness
• Being easily irritable and prone to angry outbusts
• believing that we always have to be right in every situation
• Compunction to always make excuses and not own up to a mistake
• Needing to always be the center of attention
• Being self-centered or narcissistic
• Being perpetually gloomy

Major Character Flaws

These are the issues that appear to be obvious, even to an outsider – and have much more serious consequences on our lives – and, most importantly, tend to have a negative effect to the people around us. Examples of major character flaws include:

• Irresponsible behavior leading to grave consequences for yourself and for others
• Kleptomania, pyromania or any other issue of compulsive criminality
• Drug, alcoholism or other destructive substance abuse additions
• Gambling and excessive wagering additions
• Sexual addition and other deviant behavior that has a self-destructive effect on our lives and the lives of those in our family

How Not to Let Your Character Flaws Rear Their Ugly Head

After identifying whether we have a major or a minor character flaw, we need to analyze the effect that the imperfection has on our lives and the lives of the people around us. Here are a few steps to get started on a path of improvement and healthy change.

Learn about the Different Ways in Which an Iindividual’s Character is Shaped

For us to learn how to deal with our own character flaws, we need to find out about the different ways by which a person’s character is shaped. Read books from personal growth and character development authors like Wayne Dyer, John Bradshaw, Deepak Chopra, Thomas Lickona, Buckingham and Clifton, John Wooden and many others. Many of these author’s books are available through large, online book dealers such as Amazon.com and Borders.com. Most of the time we don’t even need to make a trip to the local bookstore or library to find helpful literature nowadays – all we need is an internet connection and computer. Another largely unknown resource for research is the Google book section found at http://www.books.google.com. Here we can read excerpts and even complete chapters of selected books directly online to get an idea whether we want to order the book or not, and even gleam a certain amount of useful information.

The Internet is a veritable unlimited-resource of great character development articles and provides almost unlimited information that we can pore-over to obtain deeper insight as to what can help our character to flourish. Sites such as: selfhelpmagazine.com, psychologytoday.com and selfgrowth.com are but a few resources for finding great articles from industry professionals. Reading this material, can assist us in getting in touch with our issues and also teach us how our personal background can be a huge controlling-factor in many of our character flaws.

Realize that We are all Human, but Avoid Making it an Excuse

Once we learn to accept and understand our character flaws, we will be on our way towards learning how to better love ourselves and realize our true self-worth. While it is important to integrate into the learning process the fact that nobody’s perfect,we should never ever make that fact an excuse to avoid growth and confrontation of our issues. We should all make certain to go out of our way to change the things that we have identified as needing work and negatively controlling our lives.

Focus on the Character Flaws that Affect Others

Other people in our immediate sphere of influence put up with our character flaws on a regular basis and are probably more effected by them then we realize. So many times we don’t even understand how we are negatively distressing others. We may go on our happy ways, all the while our wife may be ready to leave us if we are late for an important meeting for the 200th time, or our kids may actually be hiding from us when we start over-reacting to a negative situation once again. So, if our imperfections and little quirks negatively affect the people we love, then we need to go out of our way and make some positive changes in our life as a whole. If we are able to take an honest inventory of our life, and pay more attention to the hurt we are perpetrating, we will start to see the areas of improvement we need to focus on. When we get to the point of true maturity, we may even be able to ask those we love what aspects of our character are most troublesome to them. If we are able to get to this point in our development, we may be in for the shock of our lives − but also, quite possibly, the most growth-oriented period of our life also.

Try to Switch Perspectives and Turn the Spotlight on Ourselves.

Its important to consider that we tend to see in others what we dislike most about ourselves. This is a hugely important dynamic in the field of psychology that we should keep in the forefront of our minds. For example, if we have a relationship with someone who is habitually late, but this carefree attitude is what has drawn us to him or her in the first place – how will we deal with the situation? Maybe we should look at it from a different angle. What is our reaction when dealing with a person who does not seem to mind the time? Do we easily get irritated? Isn’t this possibly one of our own issues that we have previously realized needs changing? Changing our perspective to the way the other person sees things will give us a broader opinion about how we should deal with your own character flaws.

Whether it’s character flaw, annoyance, addition, insecurity or whatever term we choose to call it – it always ends up being equated to some imperfection that is detrimental to us to some degree. Aren’t all people made the same, with imperfections? By admitting that we, just like every other person on the planet, have issues to deal with – we will feel much, much better about our character flaws and give ourselves the freedom to embrace change and growth as a condition of being human and normal rather than one of feeling like an outcast or so different from the rest of the world. We don’t have to stay stuck in our negative issues – we can change and be more mature, self-actualized and effective in living a life that is more pleasing to ourselves and those that must put-up with us. Lets all embrace change and grow our relationships will flourish and the world will be a better place.

The opinions expressed in the above article are solely those of the author. Dating Directory Review, its parent company and owners are not responsible for the use or application of these suggestions in any manner.