The Battle of Consistency

"Without commitment, you'll never start. Without consistency, you'll never finish."

Ahh... the Battle of Consistency...one of my greatest lessons in life so far and of course, I'm more than happy to share what I've learned.

Jumping right to it, one of my major struggles had always been consistency in different areas on my life; waking up at a certain time, eating right, exercising, posting on the blog every weekend and a bunch of other things. What I realized was that I would have a lot of really hot moments where I was fired up about doing something or engaging in some activity that was directly in line with my goals and this would last for just a couple of days...in some cases, just a couple of hours..lol. After that, I was back to square one and then I would get discouraged about my lack of consistency, constantly wondering whether I would ever get it right.  I knew I always wanted to be consistent at the productive things I did (and still do), but I just found that I wasn't. Maybe it was self-doubt or maybe it was the fact that I saw it as impossible.

For example, the new year would come and I'll be like "yeahhh!!Happy new year! whoop whoop! This year, I'm going to eat right and eat healthy!" January 1st, I'll be eating wheat bread, salads and counting calories. By 2nd January-no wait-midnight of 1st January, I'm inside the fridge looking for white bread and fanta and cake and biscuit and other human beings and the whole world...you get the general idea!! Then by January 3rd, I'm discouraged and think about what could have been. Then I'd slip into "Abeg I cannot come and go and kill myself" mood till the end of the year. LOL. I know this was me for most of secondary school. The ones that have seen my photos can testify.

Like the photo above says, consistency is related to success. You can't have the latter without the former. You want to become good at something, if you practice often enough and are consistent, you'll become an expert whether or not you had prior knowledge of how to do it. You want to attain a certain goal, you have to consistently do those things that are lined up in the attainment of that goal. You can't exercise from your bed (unless you're doing leg raises). You can't drop 10kg by eating eba and tuwo every night. You can't become closer to God if you're not consistently in his word (learned this one). You can't become a professor by going to the bar every day or night and not constantly studying. You can't get or keep good grades by sleeping all day (unless you're solving further maths in your dreams). You can't be consistent if you're not consistent.

I think one of the major things I've learned about consistency is that even when you don't feel like doing it-and you will not feel like doing it ALOT- just do it! Once you've set your mind on doing something on a particular day or particular time, just do it. I've found that even when you don't feel like doing it and you get to it, you become proud of yourself that you could be consistent (even if its for 2 days) and then it fuels you up for those times you actually want to do it!

"It's not what we do once in a while that shapes our lives. It's what we do consistently.” 

― Anthony Robbins

Some brief tips I'll share that I've worked with (and am still working with) that can help you consistent are:

1. Understand what particular areas of your life and activities require consistency; You can't go and be pumped about being consistent after reading this when you have no clue about what you're going to be consistent with. You have to be sure about what you want to be consistent about in the first place and know what activities line up with the goals in different aspects of your life. Also, understand why you need to be consistent. You can write these down and constantly refer to them when the fire burns out.

2. Decide to be consistent in those identified areas and/or actitivies; Consciously decide that you will be consistent and that you're going to go all out to practice consistency! Once you decide, take action. Take action from today! Remember that you haven't fully decided if you don't take action (lol, learned this from an Anthony Robbins book I'm currently reading). ~So don't be trying to exercise in your dream or eating healthy in an alternate universe, or say you've decided but you want to start next year. 

3. Fill your mind with positive thoughts; Refrain from self-doubt which will be sure to creep up once in a while. Even if you're doing something that requires an audience and no one is watching or applauding, keep at it! One day you'll get recognition...and if you don't you would have learned to be consistent at something and become an expert at it. Just be positive!

4. Have someone hold you accountable; Please, please and please, have someone who can check up on you and constantly hold you accountable that can ask how its going and that you can share a difficulty or two with.

5.Get back up when you fall; There will be times that you don't feel like doing it, that you don't feel like being consistent...in fact there will be times where you're not. Just remember to keep going. Most importantly, don't give up!

The Battle of Consistency can be gruesome, tough and brutal. Most times, only the strong emerge successful, bearing the scars of a battle well fought. But its all worth it when the certain result is success...

Decide to be consistent and take action!

Have a great day!x

Picture source: Betadvisor.com