People can be disciplined for a day or 2, but they always seem to struggle with being consistent for longer periods.
Countless number of people start working out, but very few are able to workout for more than 3 – 4 days in a row.
Countless people set the intention to do creative work, but very few stick to it and produce anything that’s consistent.
This is the situation everywhere.
It’s incredibly hard to be consistent because life gets in the way. We get sidetracked by things.
Relatives turn up. We have weddings to attend to. Workload increases, and so on.
Then what’s the solution?
Around 11 years ago (in 2012 – 2013), I started following the author James Clear, the author of the book Atomic Habits when he was blogging on JamesClear.com.
James Clear had a simple process for publishing blog posts – he would publish an article every Monday and Thursday without fail.
And he did this process over several months and years.
This helped him grow his blog, and as he consistently put out more and more content, it became more polished.
Eventually, this led him to writing a book and he is now an Expert on Building Better Habits.
I have made my attempts at blogging, but have not been able to be consistent with it. There’s always something more pushing or pressing that came up and caused me to give up.
Otherwise, there’d be situations where I don’t get engagement and the lack of engagement would cause me to lose out on motivation.
That’s the same situation that we all experience.
We start something…
We exercise for a few days in a row…
But life gets in the way.
A friend turns up, a relative turns up. There is a wedding to attend and we stop our attempt.
One day’s break turns into a few days of break and we give up the habit all together before the next moment of realization happens.
So how do you break this cycle?
Based on my personal experience, I’ve found only one way to do this…
And that’s…
- To Start Small
- And To NOT Deviate
By starting small, I’m talking about making the habit a simple one that it’s easy to follow even when life doesn’t go in the way.
For example…
Instead of expecting yourself to workout for 1 hour a day, how about exercising for 15 minutes?
Instead of lifting weights for 15 minutes, can you just be deliberate and walk for 15 minutes as soon as you wake up?
And can you be consistent at it even when relatives turn up at your home, you have a wedding to attend to or have some other chores that take up your time?
If you can stick to this without giving up, you’ll build the discipline muscle.
The same discipline muscle will take you to the point where you can exercise for 1 hour continuously over a period of time.
At the start, your goal should be to exercise for 1 hour a day.
On Day 1, you could exercise for 1 hour (because of inspiration, enthusiasm, etc).
You’ll probably be able to do the same thing on Day 2.
Day 3 – maybe.
Day 4 – Life has gotten in the way.
And that’s where you should have a smaller goal.
A target – such as 15 minutes.
This is the resolution that you must set for yourself…
“If I’m not able to exercise for at least 1 hour a day, I will at least exercise for 15 minutes and still stick to my habit of being disciplined when it comes to exercise”.
If you did this for every single habit that you have, a day will come when you’ll be the best version of yourself.
So take a piece of paper and write down one thing you want to be consistent at.
Find how much time would it take realistically.
Find the smallest commitment you can make and stick to on a daily basis.
And then start engaging in the habit from today. Don’t deviate.
When you are unable to stick to the schedule, stick to your smaller goal and still stick to the habit.
Use a tracker, stick to it and keep going.
Thank you!
This is Harry Ramsay, signing off from Authentic Discipline – where we teach you how to build authentic discipline that brings out the best version of yourself.
See you soon.