Introduction
Personal Foresight is defined as an individual’s ability to anticipate the future (Merriam-Webster Online Dictionary, 2010). This then allows an individual to manage his or her own future based on the anticipated results of their current actions. Champions of personal foresight state that foresight does not just happen.
Rather, it is attained through innovation, identifying trends and models to be followed, analyzing the same, developing goals to be attained and developing the necessary processes to attain the goals (Smart, 2010).Personal foresight includes formulating ways and means through which a person can achieve positive results in a given social, environmental or economic environment.
Development
But how does personal foresight develop? Well, according to Acceleration Watch (2006), futurists are more likely to develop personal foresight. The futurists are defined as people who wonder, or plan for things that they suspect will happen in future. While formal education is not a prerequisite for the development of personal foresight, Acceleration Watch (2006) observes that people who possess a wealth of personal foresight strive to be both systems thinkers and trans-disciplinary scholars.
According to Acceleration Watch (2006), there are many possible features that one can use to acquire personal foresight. Among the most dominant are innovation, thinking, and writing and analysis. A person can gain personal foresight through surveys, research, analysis, planning, argument, analogy, logic, intuition, and visioning. Prediction, scenario development and horizon scanning are also possible methods that people can use to develop personal foresight.
Benefits
The benefits accrued from personal foresight are wide and varied. According to Foresight (2010), however, personal foresight allows an individual to interrogate critique and question symbolism represented in real life, hence providing them with grounds from which they can base new options.
To make an impact in the society, personal foresight can be shared with others. However, as Acceleration Watch (2010) observe, not all people choose to share what they consider as valuable insight on what should be done in the future. Instead, they construct sole projects which are either proven practical or not by the society. However, those that choose to share their foresight with other members of the society do so through theories that are discussed and either proven possible or disapproved by scholars and analysts.
There is also a possibility that foresight triggers imagination hence enabling an individual to be more innovative and imaginative. Consequently, the creativity bred by the minds of such individuals not only recognizes challenges, but also identifies the opportunities that could trigger great changes in the society.
Contribution to the public sphere
Beyond the one’s ability to contribute to the public sphere, personal foresight is essential for personal development. For example, people save for the future based on anticipated needs in the future. A parent who gives birth today knows that their child will need schooling in three or four years time, as such personal foresight allows them to plan ahead and put some money aside for the child’s schooling financial needs.
They might even start saving for the child’s college tuition fee when she/he is one year old. On the same level, a person who decides to get married and have a family understands that with family comes greater responsibility. Personal foresight gained either from his experience growing up in a family setting, observing how families are brought up, or reading about families allows him or her to prepare ahead for the anticipated family. He or she could start by getting a bigger house, which can house more than one personal and maybe a bigger bed.
Mental Models
According to Smart (2010), personal foresight also allows an individual to acquire mental models of and about the society. By gauging the requisite complexity of each of the models, one is able to understand the amount of action or attention needed in order to successfully complete the anticipated action.
According to Foresight (2010), an individual with personal foresight does not just accept reality as part of the naturalness of the world. Rather, he or she understands that the actions that people take in the present affect how the society will be in future. This means that a person with foresight understands the relationships that exist in the society and hence understands what is needed to create a comprehensive healthy future.
Notably however, though personal foresight can be gained through observation, Floyd & Hayward (2008) state that it usually needs development and cultivation. For starters, one needs to understand what in the society is beneficial to them and what may have a negative effect. When this is established, an individual with personal foresight will then pursue the things that have a positive impact on him and the society, while trying to minimize the effects of actions that may have a negative effect.
Since no one is fully aware of what the future holds, individuals with personal foresight are always watching and learning. As Smart (2010) notes, such people are not only humble in their opinions, but also open to learning opportunities and corrections. This therefore means that they do not consider themselves as authorities on any subject, but are always investigating the possibilities that could arise in future based on cultural, social and environmental factors surrounding them.
Conclusion
According to Foresight (2010), though the discipline of social foresight has been slow to develop as a scholarly discipline, person foresight cannot be hindered by anything since it happens at an individual level.
As fate would have it however, the mind is only capable of thinking so much about the future because human inquiry into the future has its own limits and pitfalls. With the considerable foresight developed from reading, observation, analyzing and forecasting among other ways of gaining knowledge, individuals are able to make decisions about what to believe and the traps to avoid in the society.
It is notable that personal foresight cannot be fully developed without the benefit of hindsight lessons or mistakes done by others. This means that although analyzing and gaining knowledge about what might happen in future is commendable, wrongs and near-misses of the past serves to direct an individual on what to lay more emphasis on and what to avoid altogether.
Overall, personal foresight can be credit for planning practices, which have been adopted by mankind for purposes of ensuring that the future does not meet them unawares.
By anticipating the future, one is able to gain personal foresight. Without active brain processes such as imagination, innovation, identifying trends and models, analysis and goal development, personal foresight may not be as helpful to individuals. Identifying the actions to be met in order to attain positive results in a given social, environmental or economic environment is vital.
References
Acceleration Watch (2006). Futuristic (definition): Common Types of Futures Thinking. Web.
Floyd, J. & Hayward, P. (2008). Community Development for Ecological Sustainability: Working with Interiority in the Cultivation of Social Foresight. Web.
Foresight. (2010). Foresight’s Role is to help government think systematically about the future. Web.
Merriam-Webster Online Dictionary. (2010). Foresight. Web.
Smart, J. (2010). Foresight Development: personal foresight Skills Practice + general Foresight Education. Web.