Personal development is a long process that moves through our daily lives until our examples of personal goals in life become the inspiration for others
This is a story about the long process of personal development and what is needed to achieve our dreams
My name is Steven Jackson and I was born in a city in the south of England called Southampton. I enjoyed a pleasant childhood with my mother, father and a younger brother. On the whole I remember that life was happy and most of the time we had enough money. I can’t remember a situation when we were hungry even though I do recall my mother searching for coins in the kitchen draws so she could buy milk. Nowadays I put that memory down to the fact my mother is Scottish and as tight as a otter's pocket.
On the other hand, school was not so good. I was not a great pupil, but I managed to scrape through with passes and unbelievably gained an apprenticeship in metalwork for a local company. I think my dark sense of humour came from them years, which I still have a bit today even though I have been away from that life for many years. However, I have fond memories and friendships that still endure today.
My apprenticeship years seemed to move slowly until a friend of a friend asked me to join his band. I didn’t realise it then, but it was a key point in my journey or that something that allow us to say “I can be more than I am” rather than just vegetating into the same old existence. Even then I dreaded becoming my father and that is not to say that he was not a successful person in his own right, but to aspire to be another 9 to 5 employee was something I really did not want.
The years went by and I completed my apprenticeship, I purchased a house with a girlfriend and was enjoying playing the band circuit, but I was still in my mind missing something, even though I couldn’t see what it was at the time. So, I decided to return to school by starting an Open University degree course, which as I found was right out of my comfort zone, but being out of my comfort zone gave me the strength to pursue goals outside my normal social circle.