Consistency Is The Foundation For Growth
Consistency is the foundation for growth. Have you ever made a goal to start something new, for example working out, only to get derailed before you even begin? A common and popular goal at the start of the new year is to start working out more.
As a former personal trainer, I saw it time and time again. There is a surge of people at the gym at the start of the new year, but then the numbers fizzle out by the end of January and the beginning of February.
People have the best of intentions to improve themselves and their lifestyles. However, why does it seem so hard to follow through?
The simple answer is consistency.
Goal Setting
Making a goal is admirable, but if you do not have a plan, you are already setting yourself up for failure. Yes, the first step is to make a goal, but then you have to create a game plan, so you are successful in reaching that goal.
How are you supposed to make a successful game plan?
Let us tackle that question next.
A Realistic Game Plan
When you make an initial goal, you want it to satisfy the following constraints. You want your goal to be:
- Reasonable
- Attainable
- Measurable
It is important to create a goal that you can follow through with. Once the goal is established, come up with concrete actions you know you can accomplish and that will get you to your goal.
Reasonable
Pick a reasonable time frame for your goal. Let’s say you want to run a marathon, but you have never gone on a run a day in your life. It is not reasonable to give yourself a month to train. As a beginner, you are looking at 8-12 months or more, depending on your fitness level and how much time you have to devote to training.
So a reasonable goal would be a year to get into the shape you want and to be prepared for the marathon, in this particular example.
Attainable
When you make a goal, make sure you can accomplish it. Be realistic with the amount of time you have to work toward your goal.
Let’s look at another example. If you want to lose weight, it is an absolute necessity to change your eating habits. You will need to look at what you eat, how much you eat, and how often you consume food throughout the course of a day.
Anyone can change their eating habits, but you need to dive a little further into what we know about losing weight.
By taking the actions I mentioned, you can expect to lose one to two pounds of weight each day. If you give yourself a conservative time frame of two months to lose eight pounds of weight, this is an attainable goal.
See what I mean?
Measurable
Let us go back to our example of losing weight. Losing eight pounds of weight over the course of two months is something you can measure. You can use a scale to see your progress from day to day, week to week, and month to month.
An example of another measurable goal is to read for 15 minutes each day. You can track the amount of time you read, and that is measurable.
Consistency and Follow Through
Consistency is the bedrock of accomplishing any goal. Doing a little bit on a regular basis will help you to add your goal to your daily routine. It will increase your odds of success and follow through with your goal.
Let’s take an example to demonstrate the importance of consistency. One of my ongoing goals is to exercise for at least 30 minutes each day. Sometimes I cannot get in a full 30 minutes, but I always try to do something, even if it is only a five-minute walk or jog. After all, we know that life throws us curve balls, and we aren’t always motivated.
Another goal I have is to improve my writing. I know I can’t set aside an hour every day to write, but I can definitely set aside 15 minutes to write each day. It is easier to fit a goal, like my writing, into my schedule if the amount of time I shoot for is shorter. Some days I can write for longer, and that is just a win for me.
Consistency Toward Your Goal
When making a goal, it is easier to start out with a shorter time frame than to overwhelm yourself with something that doesn’t make sense for you and your situation.
If you want to start meditating, set aside five minutes each day. That is realistic for anybody. After a month or two, you may find that you want to increase that time, or that five minutes is a perfect amount of time. I set myself up for failure because I do not have that specific amount of time each day. Then I can get down on myself for not following through with my goal.
Either way, always remember that something is ALWAYS better than nothing.
Whatever goal you make for yourself, make it a priority to work on it each day. Over the long run, your daily consistent action will make working toward your goal second nature. You won’t think about it but instead just do it.
One last point I’d like to make is about the perfection mindset. Do not fall into this “militaristic” perspective.
For me, starting out with my initial goal of working out years ago, I put unnecessary stress on myself by committing to an hour and a half of lifting weights each day.
Now, I have a more realistic and doable goal to exercise 30 minutes each day, and if I cannot do the entire amount of time, I won’t sweat it. I at least do as much as I can.
I also focus on progress and growth. I utilize that positive mindset, and it has made me extremely successful in reaching my goals
I’d love to hear about the goals you are setting. Please enter them in the comment section below.
