GAINING AN ADVANTAGE
Sometimes, the best way to succeed is to fail. For if we never lose, how can we know what winning feels like? Taking on a tough challenge can highlight where strengths and weaknesses lie as well as where improvements can be made.
Perhaps, slowly over time, by simply turning up every day to learn these lessons of success and failure, we may eventually arrive at the optimum place for continued success, – purely through consistency.
Defining an objective, containing a series of steps for attaining a goal, is how we set in motion a plan for action. Self-management of our necessary work output to achieve these steps within a set time frame, plus closely monitoring the quality of all our efforts, will ultimately determine the measure of our success.
All tasks both great and small, will have a start and a finish line. Our will to commence, coupled with our determination to complete, are what motivates us to carry out tasks. No matter the size of the task, it is always how much effort we put in, for doing the task as best we can, that determines the most beneficial outcome at the finish.
However, for both big and small tasks, we may not always be able to attain such lofty levels of achievement and this can negatively affect the following attempts. So whatever the output levels may be - there is no greater focus, than for ensuring our tasks are carried out consistently well.
Slow And Sure
The story of the hare and the tortoise, is a clear message for those who believe going quick off the mark are less likely to cross the line before those who take their time.
In my 365 days of writing a daily diary/blog, there was an initial, enthusiastic burst of energy at the outset. As the first week's milestone passed, there was an increasingly intense burst of inspiration felt, to help elevate me from the bed at 5am. When the luxury of time allowed it, I'd scribe energetically from dawn until dusk. It was at times like these, with such gusto spurring me on to compose the many paragraphs of freshly acquired knowledge, that I realised, I'd effectively created enough foundation context in preparation for a good few mornings to come. And so, throughout the remaining 51 weeks, as the energy levels ebbed and flowed, I found some opportune moments, to sit back, take the proverbial foot off the gas and just cruise along for the ride.
I had my metaphorical moments of downhill free-wheeling, however, when it came to applying my determination and continued efforts to stay on track, I always managed to retain consistency. This is simply because I stuck fast to my daily blog writing to achieve my goal average.
The Mean Result
Consistency should not be a harsh tool for punishing ourselves with. It needs to be fair and considered. Consistency can be right or wrongly applied for following both good and bad pathways. Hence we can just as quickly undo any good work as we can for bringing any new benefits. So to be beneficially consistent, we need to have a moderator on the speed we work at, so we can still experience the exhilaration of optimum performance – a state of operation which works conversely well for countering those slower, but steadier paced slogs. Yes, we also can have the easy cruise - that's when we get to enjoy the ride most, as we observe ourselves being carried forward, effortlessly in the race towards our goals.
Ultimately, there is no single way to win - we need all of these ups, downs and in-between states, to flow in accordance with each other. Playing out goals consistently in this way, allows both the hare and the tortoise to cross the line together in joint first place.
Focus On The Doing
The real moral of the hare and the tortoise should be this: If we want to achieve our greatest work, we can't expect to accomplish this feat by plodding along or running at full speed. It's not achievable or realistic to do either method and win races all the time. Sometimes the efforts we put in, feel overly arduous or offer seemingly little reward. At other times, the efforts are as if no exertion has been expended at all to bring us the best result. Therefore, it surely matters less, how we approach each task's starting line or how we stride each step, but more so, on our need to remain consistent in our efforts right up to and through the finish line.
