Consistency: The Key Ingredient to Success

“Success isn’t always about greatness. It’s about consistency. Consistent hard work leads to success. Greatness will come.”

– Dwayne Johnson

Before we begin talking about why consistency is the key to success, let’s talk about what consistency actually is. Consistency means sticking to a routine and doing it over and over.

Consistent behavior will help you achieve what you aim for. Being able to continually do what is required for success, is the ability that everyone strives to learn. We try to develop habits in the hope of being consistent with them.

Now, we are consistent in some things. It might be putting off work, putting off exercise, eating junk food, drinking alcohol, smoking, making wrong choices, not sticking to a routine. See, being consistent is not the exact magic here; being consistent in the right thing is.

“Consistency is found in that work whose whole and detail are suitable to the occasion. It arises from circumstance, custom, and nature.”

– Vitruvius

We are already consistent in keeping a hold on our bad habits; what we need to learn is to turn it around and convert our bad habits into good habits. To experience a life of fullness, you need to learn to be consistent with the efforts you take, not only in your professional life but your personal life as well.

Like everything negative, we need to get negative consistency out of our lives. It is really easy to pick up damaging habits and be consistent with them, but that is what you need to stand up against.

We all make plans; making plans is easy and difficult at the same time. Knowing what you want to do is half the battle won, but this part of the battle is something that everyone does in abundance. Take New Year’s Resolutions for example. Every year you make tons of resolution, but they don’t even last a week before you go back to your old ways.

You have a plan, that’s great. Now, all you need to do is stick with it. Drive yourself to win the other half of the battle. Once you realize being inconsistent is what is stopping you from achieving your goals, you will be tempted to change that, and that is exactly what we want – a willingness to bring about the good change.

Start out by consistently accomplishing small goals before you try to hit it big

For anything to stick, you have to take baby steps. Aiming for a difficult thing is okay, as long as you know it is a long shot. If you think that you are going to decide to bring about a big change and stick with it, it’s likely not going to happen and that is when you fail.

For example, let’s say you don’t run. You decide to go running; you set the alarm, pick out your clothes and shoes, research the changes in diet, etc. But, you set your goal to run 10 miles every day. How realistic do you think that is? How do you think you are going to fare? This is you, setting yourself up for failure.

Aim for 10 miles, yes, but don’t start with that. Start with a mile and then go on increasing it until you reach your goal, and then you can set a new goal. Baby steps all the way is the most sensible way to get habitual to something.

It is said that we need 21 days to develop a new habit. So, to try and stretch yourself out for 21 days you can do certain things. When you think of it as just 21 days, it is easier to do it because you can see a deadline, and deadlines drive us. After you start doing whatever it is you want to, do it for a week and then ask yourself questions like how you feel, is this what you envisioned, will it help in the long run, etc. Anything that will remind you why you started doing this.

“Part of courage is simple consistency.”

– Peggy Noonan

Reflection of your progress is important to motivate yourself. Start journaling so that you can log in your thoughts daily about the new habit you are picking up, and you can find out if there are problem areas and immediately solve them.

Doing this gives you a third-eye perspective to your process and progress. You can help yourself to not give up. Setting up a daily routine is one thing, and sticking to it is a whole another thing.

What if you skip a day?

Don’t fret much if you skip a day. It is okay! Do not let that pull you down. Start again the next day, make a note of what made you miss that particular day, and try to find a way around so that it doesn’t happen again. Failure isn’t the stop; you just have to start again. Being consistent in your pursuance of consistency is also an important phenomenon. Stick to it, and you will see results!

“I pray to be like the ocean, with soft currents, maybe waves at time. More and more, I want the consistency rather than the highs and lows.”

– Drew Barrymore