Ideal Self Example: 10 Evidence-Based Coaching Practices
Describe almost anything you are working through and IX Coach finds the practices whose real-world fit is closest. For Ideal Self Example, these are the strongest matches in the current practice library.
Practices that may help
- Choose and study role models deliberately
Select a specific person whose character in a specific domain you want to internalize, and study how they act — not just what they say.
Virtue Ethics, Made Practical - Find living examples of your hoped-for self
Identify real people who embody your hoped-for self — their existence makes the representation concrete and credible.
Possible Selves, Made Practical - Build a behavioral bridge to the possible self
Identify one specific behavior your hoped-for self does that you can do today — then do it.
Possible Selves, Made Practical - Recalibrate ideal-self standards when they are unreachably high
Distinguish between aspirational standards that stretch you and perfectionist standards that only punish you.
Self-Discrepancy Theory, Made Practical - Act as if sages were watching — the practice of the philosophical community
Before any action, ask: would a person I genuinely respect — who embodies the values I aspire to — approve of this?
Pierre Hadot’s Spiritual Exercises - Mapping your ideal self explicitly
Articulate specifically who your ideal self is — the person you are working toward — so your partner can sculpt toward it rather than guessing.
The Michelangelo Phenomenon: How Partners Sculpt Each Other - Elaborate your hoped-for possible self
Build a detailed, sensory-rich mental picture of a concrete future version of yourself — not an abstract goal, but a person.
Possible Selves, Made Practical - Releasing the ideal version
Identify one project, relationship, or self-image that you are waiting to be perfect and engage with its actual state instead.
Wabi-Sabi: Finding Beauty in Imperfection - Borrow an identity temporarily by asking "what would [person] do?"
Temporarily adopting a role model’s identity in a specific context lowers the friction of acting as they would.
Identity Priming, Made Practical - Learning through exemplar study
Study the conduct of a person you consider exemplary and identify one specific behaviour you can emulate.
Confucian Self-Cultivation: The Mencius Approach
Does this sound like the set of challenges you might be facing?
- I have abstract ideas about the kind of person I want to be, but in a hard moment I freeze because I don’t actually know what that looks like in practice
- The future I want for myself feels so out of reach that part of me has filed it under "people like me don’t get there"
- I’ve got this clear, vivid picture of the person I want to become, and I love daydreaming about them
- The bar I hold myself to is one no actual human could ever clear, so no matter what I achieve it never counts and I’m left perpetually disappointed in myself
- I’m standing at a choice where I can feel myself about to take the easy, lesser road, and abstract principles aren’t holding me
Related concerns
- Ideal Self Actual Self
Identify one specific behavior your hoped-for self does that you can do today — then do it.
Build a behavioral bridge to the possible self
- When Virtue Ethics Role Model Selection
Select a specific person whose character in a specific domain you want to internalize, and study how they act — not just what they say.
Choose and study role models deliberately
- Actual Self And Ideal Self Example
Identify real people who embody your hoped-for self — their existence makes the representation concrete and credible.
Find living examples of your hoped-for self
- Actual Self Vs Ideal Self Examples
Identify real people who embody your hoped-for self — their existence makes the representation concrete and credible.
- Ideal Self And Actual Self Drawing
Identify one specific behavior your hoped-for self does that you can do today — then do it.
- Ideal Self And Actual Self Example
Identify real people who embody your hoped-for self — their existence makes the representation concrete and credible.
Describe your situation in your own words to search the complete practice library.