You Cannot Fix With Intensity, What Must Be Built With Consistency

Let's read that again.

You cannot fix with intensity, what must be built with consistency.

I just watched a video on instagram about this phrase and it really struck a cord. I think anyone who has had to strive to reach a worthwhile goal can relate with the phrase.

You set a goal whether it is to lose weight, or to close a certain amount of sales for the year, or to score an A for the final exam and you set a dateline of maybe a year or so to achieve it. You planned what has to be done each week or month. You get all excited to start on your plan. And then you start! But soon enough, you start to slack a little..

You skipped a few workout, you have more cheat meals than planned, you watched one more episode of The Good Place instead of revising on your school work. Whatever the actions may be, for some reason you do them and you start to stray away from the plan you've outlined to achive your goals.

And this carries on till October. You realise it's two more months till the end of the year, you've only made about 25% progress and you start to panic. But you're determined! You really, really want to achive that goal you had!

So what do you do? You increased the intensity.

You study for 15 hours a day, barely sleeping. You work out 2-3 times a day. You reach out to all places to get a sales lead. Yada yada, you get my drift.

Well, if all goes to plan (this new, intensified plan.) You get to sustain this level of activity and achieve 54.78% progress as compared to the start. However, more often than not, you end up burnt out even before reaching the finishing line.

You then get all upset & depressed. But somehow, you managed to get yourself back up at the beginning of the new year to set new goals & plans!... and the cycle repeats itself.

Now, the big question is How do you stop this cycle?

FOCUS. DISCIPLINE. HABITS.

You have to understand that if left to our own devices, we might really not stick to any plan. Hence, how do we counter that?

You have to focus on the goals that you want to achieve. Think about them often. Think about why you want to achieve those goals, think about how it would feel like to achieve them & how it would feel like failing to achieve them.

You have to be discipline about following your plan. But most importantly be discipline about NOT doing other things that do not contribute to you achieving your goals.

But discipline only goes so far because there's a limit to our willpower. As such, it's safer to build small habits that guides you towards achiving your goals and stack on those habits.

If your goal is to lose weight, start building the habit of drinking more water each day, then make it a habit to just do ANY workout for 10 mins every morning, and then build on them. If your goal is to wake up at 5am every morning, start by sleeping early, notice how much sleep your body actually needs to feel rested before setting that alarm at 5am. And this goes for every goal you have. Start making tiny habits and build on them.

The key here is to build consistency in doing activities that doesn't feel like a huge challenge to start but still push you towards your goals everyday. When you've been consistent for a few months, then focus on increasing the intensity.