Motivation Vs. Discipline Vs. Consistency

Let’s talk about motivation versus discipline. These are two things that go hand-in-hand. It is one thing to wake up one morning after starting something new to keep working on it. That is short term motivation. Most people never make it past the short term motivated stage or in simpler terms the honeymoon phase. When you start something new, there is so much hype around your idea and you are extremely motivated with whatever it is that you are doing. At this point in time all you can think of is success and things going right and that is your motivation. Now let’s fast forward six months. You have been doing this for a while. You wake up every day do what you do, but then something goes wrong. For example you lose a client or you lose an important asset to your company. 99% of people would just quit at this point. Most people quit when it gets hard because when there is something significant standing between them and their goal, especially something hard and different, they quit. Motivation only brings people so far. Let’s bring discipline into this equation. Someone who is disciplined, will set goals. Every day this person will work towards their goals no matter what. Having discipline means you will work as hard as you can, despite things going right or wrong. This isn’t just over a short period of time. This only pertains to long periods of time and many failures. Once a person can become consistent that will create more motivation. Discipline and motivation and consistency all have a deeper connection when applied together. To put everything together motivation will build discipline, discipline will build consistency and consistency will build motivation. This becomes a huge circle if done right.

You’re probably wondering what do I do to keep this somewhat infinite cycle up and running. Every week on Sunday, I take this day to look at how I did last week, and what I can do better next week. I also take that time to plan my week out. I plan what content to post on each account and I plan all the other activities I will do that week. Its very important to have a plan and to stick to it. Please read that again…Have a plan and stick to it. If you are mid way through the week and you decide to steer off your plan then you have already lost. Being constant with a plan especially when motivated will help with discipline. Discipline comes in when I think, ok today im doing this no matter what, and then applying that to the rest of my week. You have to be constant with it. Once your constant and see results any loss of motivation will come back.