If you are starting a new project, it is okay to be inconsistent because you will be able to create a solid plan that way. Let us talk about how to be more consistent and achieve your goals in life.
How to be more consistent, you ask?
Blogging is not easy even for me who is a writer. Since I started this blog, I changed my posting schedule a lot of times because I am not always motivated.
But I want to rank more blog posts on Google, and learning how to be consistent can help me achieve that goal. Here is how to be more consistent:
- Don’t follow a schedule. Let the schedule adjust for you.
- Always remember why you started.
- Think about the people you want to prove wrong.
- Allow yourself to make mistakes to lessen the pressure.
- Find a tool that makes things easier and more convenient.
- Be anonymous.
Let’s begin.
How to Be More Consistent and Achieve Your Goals in Life
When I started blogging, it was hard to finish one blog post because I also needed to think about whether I was saying the right things. I feared making mistakes.
My English back then was already better compared to that of others. But now that I have improved significantly, I can see that it wasn’t as good as I thought.
I have been writing since I was a child, and I started learning English when I was 4.
However, I was not writing in English enough in the past, so I had not reached the point where no one could tell I was a non-native.
I also was not writing professionally. I could make mistakes, and it wouldn’t be a big deal because no one would care. Feedback helps with improvement.
I think one of the reasons why it is hard for people to stay consistent is that they think they don’t have the “right” to do what they do. Heard of impostor syndrome?
According to Healthline, you will know you have an impostor syndrome if you think you are a fraud when you do something great, and the greatness is real.
Another reason is that they started the project because it was exciting, but once they begin working on it and it becomes tedious, the excitement is gone.
So is their motivation. Can you relate?
This blog has been existing since 2019. There was a time when I didn’t publish a new post for over 5 months. I lost the motivation, and the excitement was gone.
But I kept moving forward because I remembered why I started. Keeping your goal in mind will help you be more consistent and overcome your self-doubts.
That is just one of the ways to be more consistent. Below are more ways how to be more consistent and achieve your goals in life.
1. Don’t follow a schedule. Let the schedule adjust for you.
I am an organized person, but after months of rescheduling the events in my Google Calendar, I decided to let to-do lists control my day.
Being consistent is easier that way because I list down what I need to do, and I can do the tasks whenever I want within the day or week. Anytime before the deadline.
Schedules help you be disciplined, but the lack of flexibility may stress you out. Dealing with stress will hinder you from being consistent.
According to Thrive Global, having a flexible schedule can boost the performance of employees. It has a positive effect on the company.
There are schedules we must adhere to, such as meetings and appointments. But if the task or event is not time-sensitive, do it when you feel like it.
Just keep in mind the deadline.
If you can’t let go of your calendar, set a time for work, social life, personal projects, and whatever responsibilities you have. But be flexible with the tasks.
2. Always remember why you started.
Sometimes, I don’t update my projects for months because I either lack motivation or want to change my plans and restart. But I never thought of quitting.
I have been working on my passion projects since 2019. I don’t want my efforts to go to waste, so I will pause but I will never quit.
The major reason why I started my personal projects is for me to have an outlet where I can be creative, and to improve my professional life.
Psychology Today explains that people expect because they think that by doing or achieving something, they will be happy.
I don’t care so much about the numbers. I can earn $0 or have 0 views and that is fine. Earnings and readers are just a bonus.
I would quit only if I lost my creativity and decided to stop having a career.
Many people pay too much attention to metrics and ROI. If you are one of them, seeing 0 will demotivate you even if popularity is not your goal.
To be consistent despite the lack of progress, remember why you started.
3. Think about the people you want to prove wrong.
If it were not for those people who ruined my life, I wouldn’t have the motivation to get my passion projects off the ground.
I didn’t want to give up even though I was damaged and miserable. I didn’t want them to win and be happy. I thought: “You will all pay for what you did.”
I think that is a bad thought.
As much as I think we should forgive people and let go of negative emotions we feel, anger can make us do what we think we can’t do.
Psychology Today says that people get angry when what they wanted to happen didn’t happen. They are disappointed.
It is a great force. It pushes us to do things that we wouldn’t have done if we were feeling neutral or positive about it.
If you want to achieve something, think about the people who refused to support you or laughed at your ideas. Allow yourself to be angry at them.
Boredom is sometimes the reason why we are inconsistent. It was also mentioned in James Clear’s Atomic Habits. It stuck with me.
4. Allow yourself to make mistakes to lessen the pressure.
When I first started publishing blog posts, my posts were not bad but flawed.
I used English idioms incorrectly, there were grammatical mistakes, and I sounded like a robot. English is my second language, btw.
Some posts were also terribly written because I was forcing myself to write just to have blog updates. I needed to edit my blog posts. I had to rewrite some!
I have been working on my passion projects since 2019, and I made a lot of mistakes. But if I hadn’t allowed myself to make mistakes, I wouldn’t get here.
Tony Robbins says that one of the limiting beliefs you should overcome to achieve goals is your caring about other people’s opinions.
If you are a perfectionist, you will overthink every little detail. If you see even 10 flaws (yes, you count them), it will make you feel bad. You may stop!
You can learn how to be more consistent when you stop being too hard on yourself. This is cliché but no one and nothing can be perfect in this world
5. Find a tool that makes things easier and more convenient.
We will more likely be consistent if we don’t follow a schedule, but scheduling our posts is efficient. It helps us save a lot of time. I schedule my posts!
My posting schedule on this blog is every 15th and 30th of the month. On my personal blog, 10th, 20th, and 30th. On A Writer in Disguise, days with 5 and 0.
I don’t need a scheduling tool for my blogs because it is a built-in feature. But I need it for social media and other communication.
Currently, I only use Pinterest. I quit the other social media platforms for good.
On Pinterest, I use the built-in scheduler. I can schedule posts for up to two weeks, and 100 is the maximum number of posts I am allowed to schedule. Great!
When I was on Instagram, I was using Creator Studio for scheduling. I liked it because it was not limited compared with other free scheduling tools.
Using a scheduling tool can help manage the impact of social media on mental health. You can be consistent without spending time on the platform. SocialPilot shares social media scheduling tools.
The only thing I didn’t like about it was that I had to keep my Facebook account active. I had to reactivate my Facebook account for that.
The good thing about scheduling is you can create posts in bulk in a few hours, which will keep your blog and pages updated for weeks.
It makes being consistent easier!
6. Be anonymous.
If the reason why you are inconsistent is that you worry about what people think, be anonymous, use a pseudonym, or use just your first name.
There was a time when I used only my first name to introduce myself, including on this blog. I was anxious: What if they hate me because the quality is bad?
In an article by Mayo Clinic, if you fear being judged for your mistakes, you may be dealing with social anxiety.
I am Alexia. There are lots of Alexia all over the world, and my full name is not common. No one would have guessed I was the one who created or wrote the post.
But I don’t feel anxious anymore, so I use my full name now. My face is also at the beginning of this post; I figured it would add some humanness to this blog.
Last Words
Being inconsistent is not necessarily bad. In fact, if I had not been inconsistent over the last few years, I wouldn’t have known what I wanted to do.
Trying out many different things and making mistakes along the way helps you figure out what works and what doesn’t, as well as what you like and dislike.
Now you know how to be more consistent!
If you enjoyed reading how to be more consistent and achieve your goals in life, here is a video of me talking about how consistency helped me with my projects:
