All you have to do is outlast your own resistance, and you can achieve anything you set your mind to. Resistance may make its presence felt in enumerable ways and forms, all you have to do is to take your focus from the obstacles to the solutions, bear with the temporary pain and persist when the going gets tough.
If you manage to persist, at times avoiding and at others digesting the hazardous impact of fear,failure,criticism and complaint, which comes your way, there is nothing in this world to stop you from surpassing your achievements and establishing a legacy.
You don’t need super human talent to achieve your objectives, may it be starting a new business, changing an old habit, trying to shed some extra fat or gain some muscle, all you need is a vision and the tenacity to never accept defeat.
You will see how you get better with every failed attempt. You will develop mental and physical skills to dodge obstacles when you face them for the second time. You will expand beyond your own means making tasks which appeared herculean turn effortless. All of this will only be possible only if you can persist for long enough.
The initial pursuit of an earnest objective is always rosy, your vision of a better future fuels your initial surge. Your confidence grows for the first few days but soon you discover how far you actually are from what you pursue. At this point your faith dwindles, motivation crumbles, and energy enervates.You find yourself in the grasp of resistance.
Although this resistance lasts forever but it is typically ferocious in the initial part, making you more likely to quit. Here are 6 ways to get out of the grasp of this initial lethargy and persist till you achieve your objectives and even further:
1. Don’t give resistance the upper hand, overcome the inertia of lethargy– Don’t fill your plate with too much initially, the more difficult you make your routine the more chances you have of finding an excuse of not following it. I have seen people at the gym with extensive workout patterns lasting for hours, which appears exciting initially but then I see these people complaining, being irregular and finally giving up.
Overcome the inertia of lethargy gently, complexity might add to it. If you want to achieve too much too soon, you give resistance the upper hand, it will feed off the complexity of your routine and never allow you to get into a habit
2. Build self credibility by making it a ritual– It is essential to build credibility in your own eyes. This can be done by making a small daily commitment in accordance with your goal and following it until it becomes a habit. You can then proceed to gradually adding to this small commitment. Look at it as a small daily ritual which you have to accomplish at all costs. Do it till you cant do without it.
Don’t give your any excuses to miss out on the daily ritual for a week and you will reduce your chances of quitting remarkable.
3. Set a time and place – Set a particular time and place for the daily ritual in pursuit of your dream. If it is about fitness you should be at the same gym at the same time everyday. You might not even work out but get into the habit of showing up at the same time everyday. If it is about work, show up at your desk at the same time at the same place everyday. There shouldn’t be any distraction big enough to prevent you from showing up at the specific place at the specific time.
When you set yourself a time and place you build the pillars of persistence. When you show up on your desk or at the gym at the allotted time beating the inertia of rest, comforts and lethargy, you make a statement of intent towards your goal, this sends shivers down resistance’s spine.
4. Get inspired– Instead of wasting your time snapping and chatting or indulging in worthless banter, (which indicates that you are entrapped by resistance) utilize your time and resources to read and view other success stories. Most of them will have a similar pattern, one where the person became successful because he persevered when other more gifted, talented and educated people wasted their time. He persevered even when he failed, he persevered through hail, thunder, lightning and storm. He persevered till he outlasted resistance and time glazed him with the coating of a champion.
Watch videos, read stories, find the time to appreciate and chat with persevering people around you, find out what keeps them going, what they believe in and use this to nourish your mentality.
5. Compete with the mirror– Resistance cannot be exterminated, it can only be controlled by your ability to persist. Resistance will knock at your door perpetually, waiting for that little gap when you let things slide, so that it can poison you with comforts, lethargy and empty satisfactions. Persistence then becomes a full time job, which can only be accomplished if you compete with the mirror, yourself.
Never rest on your laurels or bask in your accomplishments, don’t stop bettering your records even if you thwart outside competition, be motivated to do better instead of quitting when you lose, this will put you in an endless loop of improvement. If you look to improve yourself each day, you will easily persist beyond your resistance.
6. Make it an obsession– If you are not obsessed about your dream, you will never be able to generate the emotional energy to persist beyond resistance. Resistance is like an unstoppable force, which can only be kept at bay through an unshakable will. This would require a super human effort, thus the conscious mind, with all its logic will not be much of an aid. You will have to dig deep down inside and take your dream to the core of your heart, activate your subconscious so that it can empower you with all the tools to persist and stand strong against resistance.
Make it an obsession so wild that your eyes communicate the fire which burns inside you, only then will you manage to go the full distance and beat resistance to it.
If you take your dreams seriously you need to make a habit of persisting beyond obvious discomforts, overcome the inertia of lethargy and redefining your limits on a daily basis. Resistance might try to sabotage your dreams, but its your duty to fight for them, persist with your efforts and you will be blessed with the heavenly fruits of your hard work.
Have a good day.