opinion
Self-improvement is everywhere, but most of what passes for growth is cosmetic: a vision board set as your lock-screen, a manifestation journal packed with affirmations, a TikTok therapist diagnosing you with avoidant attachment in thirty seconds.
These gestures are not wrong. They can soothe, orient, even spark a flicker of awareness. But awareness without endurance is decoration, not development. A vision board will not carry you through a hundred unanswered applications. Writing ‘I am loved’ in a journal will not steady you when your work is ignored in public. Knowing your attachment style will not stop you from spiraling when someone ghosts you.
This is the lie of modern self-improvement: it teaches us to feel comforted, not to become capable. Real self-improvement is not aesthetic; it is structural. It is the invisible scaffolding that holds a life upright when the external weight increases. And it is built not through rituals that soothe, but through actions that hurt - not for applause, but because they make you stronger.
Endurance over serenity: Take emotional regulation. Culture sells it as serenity - meditation apps, breathing playlists, calming rituals. But real regulation is rarely calm. It is brutal. It is keeping yourself from checking if they still view your stories. It is posting your work again after your last attempt fell flat. It is opening the next application before you’ve even read the last rejection email. It is holding back from chasing someone who has already shown they don’t want to be caught.
This is not serenity; it is endurance. It is training your nervous system to withstand silence, neglect, indifference - without abandoning your path. Every time you resist the pull to chase, prove, or spiral, you reinforce your frame.
No one notices. No one applauds. But over time, these invisible acts become resilience - the kind that makes collapse impossible when real weight arrives.
The wellness industry promises calm. Real growth demands you stay upright through chaos.
Attentional control: If regulation is endurance, attentional control is direction. And nothing in modern culture works harder to scatter us.
We call it “staying informed” when we scroll headlines. We call it “self-awareness” when we collect labels to explain our behaviour. We call it “networking” when we check who liked our posts, who seems further ahead. But all of this drains the very fuel needed to build.
Real focus is refusal. It is closing the tab that pulls you into comparison. It is resisting the twitch to measure your progress against someone else’s post. It is returning your energy to your own work again and again, even when the entire world is designed to pull you away.
Attention is energy. Every leak into distraction shrinks capacity. Every act of containment expands it. A life built on scattered focus will always feel hollow - because the energy was never held long enough to become anything real. To redirect focus inward again and again is to stop spilling and start filling.
This is why “productivity hacks” often fail. They organise the noise but never quiet it. Focus is not about stacking the perfect tactics; it is just about refusing what distracts you.
Disciplined action over aesthetic: Modern self-improvement loves to romanticize habit. Morning routines filmed in soft lighting. Bullet journals in perfect handwriting. Productivity stacks arranged like décor.
But discipline is not aesthetic. It is pushing through the boredom, the silence, the sense that it doesn’t matter - and doing it anyway. Posting your art when no one is asking for it. Editing the photos when nobody is watching. Going to the gym when your body feels heavy. Discipline is the daily proof that you can keep going without applause.
This is the real “manifestation”: not writing affirmations, but becoming the kind of person whose actions align so consistently with their vision that results have nowhere else to go.
What falls away: Here is the hardest part of self-improvement: growth strips things away. The distractions, the shallow ties, the roles that loved your insecurity - they all fall off.
The friendships that fed on distraction loosen. The jobs that rewarded performance but drained you begin to dissolve. The romantic relationships that depended on you proving your worth collapse.
It feels like loss. It feels like abandonment. But it is not. It is precision. Anything built on validation, chaos, or fragile connection cannot survive a frame made of resilience, focus and discipline. It breaks. And in breaking, it clears space.
Think of the relationship that thrived only when you were available to chase. The friend who only called when they needed your chaos to make theirs feel lighter. The job that praised you when you performed but left you hollow. These cannot stand when you stop chasing, stop proving, stop scattering yourself. They fall away.
This “orbit cleanse” feels cruel in the moment. But it is the most exact protection you will receive. You are not losing. You are being stripped of what cannot hold the weight of who you are becoming.
This is why real self-improvement feels lonelier before it feels fuller. You are not decorating collapse anymore. You are building stability.
So, what is self-Improvement, actually? It is not the vision board, the pastel affirmations, the eucalyptus candle. These may soothe, but they do not strengthen. They may orient, but they do not construct.
Real self-improvement is endurance. It is the quiet daily work of holding steady when you want to spiral, keeping your focus when the world fractures it, moving your body and your mind even when no one claps. It is taking action towards your vision.
And from that effort, capacity grows. And from capacity, life expands.
The lie of modern self-improvement is that you need to feel better. The truth of real self-improvement is that you need to become stronger.
Neshmeeya Abbas is an author based in London. She can be reached at [email protected]
