It’s an open secret that consistency is the key to success. But how does one become more consistent? Is it an innate ability that one is born with or can it be developed? Read on to learn.
Consistency is really about enjoying the day-to-day grind. Most of us want to get to the end, we want to already have accomplished. It’s like a kid asking “Daddy, when will we get there?”. As a result, we become impatient.
Impatience is the enemy of enjoyment and without enjoyment, our mind will keep placing obstacles in our path. The mind after all is a pleasure-seeking, pain-avoiding mechanism. We can use this understanding to help promote greater consistency. Anything that helps us enjoy the journey instead of being fixated on the destination will help us become more consistent.
On the flip side, will power is a finite resource. As a result, actions or behaviors that help us use will power more efficiently will help us more easily build consistency. As an example, actions that eliminate obstacles that prevent us from doing our chosen activity or project as much as possible.
So we have two broad categories of ideas that will help with consistency – pleasure promotion and will power efficiency.
Here are 5 tips based on these categories that will help you become more consistent. You can come up with many more if you use this basic framework.
Tips based on Will Power Efficiency
- Come up with a manageable routine and stick to it. It is better to commit to less in the beginning. For example, let’s say you want to learn the guitar. Commit to practicing 15m every day.
- Eliminate any friction that will prevent you from sticking to your routine. For our future guitar maestro, this could mean keeping the instrument easily accessible.
- There may be days, where sh** hits the fan and you can’t stick to your committed time. On such days, avoid the temptation to not do anything at all. Instead work on the goal for at least a few minutes. The key is to keep building momentum towards the goal.
Tips Based on Pleasure Promotion
- At the beginning of every day, reconnect with your motivation for the goal. This could be as simple as repeating an affirmation. For example, let’s say our guitar learner is motivated by the thought of playing like Jimi Hendrix. At the beginning of every day, they could visualize themself playing like Jimi Hendrix.
- Try to set aside expectations and just enjoy the process. Anything worth accomplishing takes time, so enjoy the process instead of being impatient to get to the finish line.
There you have it. A few simple tips based on the two fundamental ideas of will power efficiency and pleasure promotion. If you internalize these fundamental ideas, you will be able to come up with many, many more.