What is the key to staying consistent??

Focusing on important areas of your life like education and career ......

.... and relegating things like diet and exercise to something that you just do every day like how you shower and brush your teeth.

I do basically the same exercise each day, except weekends when I add more variety.
I eat basically the same things each day, except Saturdays when we have pizza.

Habit. Building good habits has challenges, but once it becomes a habit it's just there and it's automatic. Do you actively think about brushing your teeth in the morning and before bed or do you just do it without a thought? It's just habit and you just do it as a part of your normal routine right? You had to create that habit at some point (presumably in early childhood)...but it's there now and you just do it without thinking about it.

The difficulty in creating healthy habits is that they usually come with some friction and bad habits usually come with very little friction. It's a whole lot easier to get home from work and sit down and watch t.v. (no friction) than it is to get home and gear up and go for a run. But once you've formulated the habit, it's no big deal...and in fact one would have a feeling of being a little off if they for some reason couldn't get out for that run because they're routine would be broken.

The key is understanding that their will be some friction and accept that and accept that implementing good habits and systems might cause some initial discomfort, but also, remove as much friction as possible. As an example, several months ago I decided I was going to walk 2 miles everyday as a baseline of minimum daily physical activity. I toyed with walking in the evenings, but I'd get home from work and inevitably something would arise that needed tending to or I'd be tired...or the afternoon winds kicked up or whatever. Too much friction left me inconsistent in my endeavors. So I decided I would take my walks during lunch for which there was little to no friction involved and I found it a nice way to break up my day. I've been pretty consistent with that now for about 4-5 months.

Recently I decided that I wanted to get back on the bike...no racing and training like I used to, but back on the bike on the regular, but when...evenings were too much friction for consistency. So I sat down and went through a typical day and scored my habits and the one that stood out to me was that I get up every morning at 6AM and get my coffee and go out on my patio, watch the sunrise, etc. I was spending about 45-60 minutes every morning doing that...not inherently a bad thing, but if I'm trying to get back on the bike...well, I'm much better served spending that time on the bike. Not wanting to completely lose my mental health morning routine entirely I decided to just get up half an hour earlier at 5:30 and have my coffee and my sit with the sunrise and then get on my bike by 6AM at the latest.

There was very little friction in that as I was only moving my waking time up by half an hour and after the first week or so I was easily waking up and beating my alarm by 5 or 10 minutes. I also very much enjoy riding (no friction) and 30-40 minutes out on the trail first thing in the morning has been glorious. If my wife wanted me to go running with her, that would be an entirely different matter...a lot of friction because I absolutely loath running, so I don't do it.

Anyway, it takes about 30 days of consistent effort to establish a habit and about 90 days to really have that habit set and really start to firm up...so it does take work and effort...but think about what you want your identity to be and then put in motion the systems and habits needed to establish that identity.

These are known as identity habits rather than objective habits. Identity habits are beneficial in that they don't allow you to put all of your focus on a singular objective. For example, "I want to identify as a healthy and fit person...so I implement systems that healthy and fit people do...and over time I become a fit and healthy person (who over time will more likely than not achieve a healthy weight and more easily maintain it) VS. "I want to lose weight and be XXX Lbs in X months"...this singular objective is going to end up being the primary focus and the primary determination of success or failure when in reality, there are a lot of other good things happening behind the scenes besides weight loss when you focus on being a healthy and fit individual.

With objective habits people also tend to get stuck in what is called the plateau of latent potential because they're putting in all of this work but the results aren't happening the way they thought they would or on the time line they wished...so they get mired in the valley of disappointment, give up, start back up...yo-yo, etc

To me, as others have said, consistency. I add, a lack of lust for results. Just execute the plan every day, if you don't care about the results the results will come. If you allow yourself to become fixated on them the first time that your expectations are not met you will lose motivation.
Personal example: For some mysterious reason my weight increased yesterday (probably scale placement, whatever) I don't care, I know my plan works, and I am sticking with it.
There was a time I would have freaked about this, no more. That kind of thing happens for all kinds of reasons, don't tie your motivation to it, tie your motivation to sticking with a plan that you know works.
A good diet with a calorie deficit works adds some exercise (what you can do without hurting yourself) works.
Let executing your plan be your motivation, that is the essence of consistency.

Reasonable goals.

Striving for a deficit too big or too much exercise is a recipe for inconsistency. Reasonable goals that are easy to achieve set you up for success long term.

jsmestflowers wrote: »

To me, as others have said, consistency. I add, a lack of lust for results. Just execute the plan every day, if you don't care about the results the results will come. If you allow yourself to become fixated on them the first time that your expectations are not met you will lose motivation.
Personal example: For some mysterious reason my weight increased yesterday (probably scale placement, whatever) I don't care, I know my plan works, and I am sticking with it.
There was a time I would have freaked about this, no more. That kind of thing happens for all kinds of reasons, don't tie your motivation to it, tie your motivation to sticking with a plan that you know works.
A good diet with a calorie deficit works adds some exercise (what you can do without hurting yourself) works.
Let executing your plan be your motivation, that is the essence of consistency.

jsmestflowers,

"I don't care" and "execute the plan" may sound robotic to the ears; however, after watching the methodical pre-game routine of Tom Brady from the endzone in the 2005 season as he kept throwing quick slants over and over and over while the Steeler team ran a multitude of random plays, I came away with more evidence for repetition makes good muscle memory. Winning.

The result that game: the Patriots beat the Steelers

Result that season: Steelers won the Super Bowl

Build resilience in the 'character muscle memory' by repetition just like Ben Franklin did on his own.


Happiness by Design.