3 Ways To Be More Consistent & Disciplined

Have you all noticed how women are advancing at such a rapid rate. Everywhere you turn you see more and more women starting businesses, becoming millionaires, getting in shape, eating healthier, going back to school for advanced degrees, and climbing the corporate ladder.

Women’s ambition is at an all time high, and it’s super inspiring to watch!

And, I can guarantee with 1000% certainty, that you are one of those ambitious women too (otherwise, you wouldn’t be here 😆).

I’ll also humbly admit that I am one of those super ambitious women too! Over the last eight years, I have aspired to start a business and get fit. But I found that achieving those goals was a lot more difficult than I expected because I didn’t have the discipline to stay on track long enough to see the results. That is, until this year, 2020.

Yes, it has taken me eight, I repeat, EIGHT loooooooooong ass years to finally learn how to stay consistent, focused, and determined. And, instead of you all spending countless years (like I did) learning how to stick to your plan so you can hit your goal, I decided to share what I learned and how to easily incorporate it into your life.

So, here’s what I learned:

1. Change the habits that are contradictory to achieving your goals. My goals were to start a successful business and to get fit. So, I had to search my daily habits to identify the things that I unconsciously do that would prevent me from starting and running a successful business and getting to the gym a few times a week. After doing some self reflection to uncover my habit, I realized that I had quite a few patterns of behavior that I needed to change. Here’s one example: I had a bad habit of procrastinating and pushing tasks off to the next day. Well when it comes to getting fit, if you keep saying ‘I’ll do it tomorrow”, tomorrow turns into a week, then a month, then six months, and you still haven’t started. So, that was one bad habit that I had to change because it was creating a behavior that conflicted with my goal. So, take inventory of your own habits. Do some self reflection and identify the things that you do regularly that are preventing you from moving closer to your goal.

2. Wake up earlier. Yup, that early morning, awful alarm clock buzz that jars you out of a good, deep, sound sleep is actually a major life hack! Getting up early has many benefits. As a matter of fact, it has too many benefits to list here, but I’ll share a few of the benefits that I’ve found most useful for staying on track.

1. You get a head start. Everyone else is still asleep, so you can get quite a few things done without being interrupted. This allows you to focus so you can get some things done quicker and more accurately which ultimately increases your productivity.

2. You can have some peaceful and quiet time to yourself. This is a form of self care. Every woman NEEDS “me” time. If you get up early, you can carve out 30-40 minutes to be alone with your thoughts, feelings, and emotions. You can journal, meditate, read, write, create your to-do list, make plans, listen to music, exercise, or do any of things that make you feel good and relaxed. Lots of women think they don’t have time to have “time for themselves”, but the bottom line is that you have to MAKE time for yourself… and early morning hours are a perfect time for self-care.

3. Extra hours needed to work on goals. If you have some things that you want to achieve or do, you have to carve out the time to get them done. And, it’s highly unlikely that you have enough time in your day with the way that your habits and schedule is already set up, because if you already had the available time, you would have achieved the goal by now - right? 🤔 So, early morning is great for adding extra hours to your day so that you have the time to add tasks and activities that you need to do to achieve your goals.

3. Patience and consistency - the secret sauce. This is where most people struggle because most of us want what we want and we want it ASAP (lack of patience). We start new habits and lifestyle changes, but if we don’t see the results fast enough we get discouraged and lose interest (lack of consistency). Anything that you are working toward takes time. There is no such thing as overnight success, quick r results, or swift victories. So, change your expectations about how long it will take to see results or manifest your dream and learn how to be patient… oh, and let’s not forget, while you’re being patient, you need to consistently take the actions and do the tasks that will get you to the goal. Yes, that means you are going to have to keep putting in the work and the effort even when you have no tangible results to keep you motivated. I know this one is hard, like I said earlier, this is where most people struggle. So, to provide you with a higher level of help, I created an online course to help you learn how to be productive and it touches on all of what we are discussing in this section. You can access it here.

Remember, it has taken me eight, yes EIGHT years to learn how to be patient and consistent. But, as soon as I added that secret sauce, the results poured in, my confidence increased, and I FINALLY felt accomplished.

While you think about when and how to incorporate the 3 suggestions above, keep in mind that being consistent and disciplined will feel like forcing yourself to do something that you despise IF your goal (you’re reason why) is not something that you’re passionate about. In other words, in order to become tenacious, keep going, and remain consistent, in order to prevent life’s distractions from getting in the way; you need to have a goal that ignites your passion, desire, or purpose!

Remember, I mentioned above that hitting your goal will take consistent effort over a period of time with no results. So, if your goal is void of passion, burning hot desire, or purpose, you will inevitably run out of motivation and/or lose interest in it.

As I talk to women about how to achieve their goals, they often believe that they don’t have enough willpower or motivation to stick to it. My observation is that's most often not the case. The most common reason for a lack of motivation is having superficial goals that are not in alignment with a purpose or passion.

So, take a look at your goals. Reassess them if you need to. Then work on taking action and including them into your life and daily practices.

The sooner you start, the sooner you’ll start manifesting your goals and dreams. So, get to it Queen! The life you want is patiently waiting for you to come and get it!