If you’re used to losing, or consider yourself a loser, know that winning is a habit, and you can become a winner. I’ll start this post with a famous Aristotle quote.
We are what we repeatedly do; excellence then is not an act but a habit.
I believe the only person who can define you as a loser or winner is yourself. When you are on your death bed and you’re taking your last breath, you know whether you lived in alignment with your values and your personal journey. No amount of money or awards can make up for not living true to yourself and your quest. You must live your quest, your heart knows whether you’re on course or not. If I go a day or two without taking action in the direction of my life goals my self esteem drops greatly, and I feel purposeless. Its a horrible feeling that will go on to the next day.
So, it’s very important for you and I to hustle to do the tasks we need to do daily to give us long term benefits. Once they become habits they will have little to no resistance to complete. You eventually get to a point where it becomes painful to not do the task. You simply must get things done if you want a certain end goal. If you want an A in class, if you want an awesome girl in your life, if you want 1 million dollars a year you must take the consistent action to get the result. You can’t rely on motivation or willpower, you must have discipline. I would even suggest that as you gain more discipline you will notice yourself getting closer and closer to your goals, of course there are many variables but this one is key.
Many of you have a certain perception of who you are , we’re either tall or skinny, fat or short, smart or dull, introverted or stupid, but really all that we have are isolated moments in our lives that we were perceived by others or perceiving ourselves as those things. Carol Dweck, author of Mindset says from a young age we develop a model of who we are and what we are capable of. She graphs peoples mindset from a young age to two categories those with a growth mindset, and those with a static mindset. Those with a static mindset believe their competencies and skills are clear and solid. Whereas, those with the growth mindset are aware of what level they’re operating at, however, believe that the more effort they put in, the closer to expert they will become. You can apply this model to your week to week level of procrastination and discipline. At times these two things will stagnate, which will become obvious to you if you graph both. You’ll find that as procrastination increases, discipline decreases and vice versa, this is what my graph is reporting to me.
How discipline you are will increase if you are conscious of the tasks and its completion rate on a day to day basis. See! you can learn and choose to be a winner. What has helped me is developing an internal locus of control which is a belief that my success and failure is completely based on my action, or inaction. People who have developed an internal locus of control understand that successes and setbacks are not random phenomenas in the universe that effects only those with the same first and last name as you. Sales coach Brian Tracy says that the universe is bias to no man, all that it knows is science and math.
If you missed a day of discipline and you have that pain in your chest from failing to keep your promise don’t do these two common things
Lie 1: Accept that this is who you are, and this is how you behave. This is not true at all. Nothing you do or have done will ever solidify your place in the universe. We are constantly changing, literally every moment our cells and our mind is shifting.
Lie 2: Rationalize, suggest that either it was “out of your control” or you had a good reason to break your commitment. People are really good at brainwashing themselves, but like what we said before, you know if your messing up, regardless how good your excuse to yourself about the excuse your making etc (woo-oh, the inception effect.) Constant excuses is just setting you up for failure. One excuse today will make it easier to make another one tomorrow.
What you should do if you missed a day of discipline is acknowledge you were a piece of crap slug the other day, try to understand why you behaved that way, and make a memo to not do it again. Just like a child you must be compassionate with yourself, yet discipline. I got this idea from reading Learned Optimism by Martin Seligman
In closing:
You must remember that you can never be a loser, you might have just made losing into a habit.
The universe is not bias, all it knows is science and math
Develop the internal locus of control, and the growth mindset.
You know whether or not you’re living your true personal journey with passion, and that is what makes you feel like a winner or loser.
Cheers, Realifegamer
