Self-discipline and persistence

Benjamin Disraeli once said: “Beware of endeavoring to become a great man in a hurry. One such attempt in 10,000 may succeed. These are fearful odds.”

Brian Tracy believes that per­sistence is self-discipline in action. Your ability to persist in the face of all setbacks and temporary fail­ures is essential to success in life. Napoleon Hill said, “Persistence is to the character of man as carbon is to steel.” The primary reason for success is persistence, and, like­wise, the primary reason for failure is lack of persistence, quitting far too soon.

There is a direct link between self-discipline and self-esteem. Each time you discipline yourself to do what you should do, when you should do it, whether you feel like it or not, your self-esteem in­creases. This why there is direct re­lationship between self-esteem and persistence. Each time you persist and force yourself to continue on, even when you feel like quitting, your self-esteem goes up.

Each act of self-discipline strengthens every other act of self-discipline. Every act of persistence strengthens every other act of persistence. When you discipline yourself to per­sist, over and over, you like and respect yourself more and more. You become stronger and more confident. Eventually, you become unstoppable.

THE REWARD OF PER­SISTENCE

Persistence is its own reward. Every time you force yourself to persist on a task, whether it is large or small, you feel happier and better about yourself. When you go the extra mile and do more than you are paid for or more than is expected, your self-esteem goes up. You feel more powerful and in greater control of your life. In your career, when you go the extra mile you put yourself on the side of the angels. The primary difference between winners and losers in life is simple: Winners never quit, and quitters never win.

You can increase your ability to persist by talking to yourself positively. Say these words: “I am unstoppable!” Before you begin any major undertaking, prepro­gram yourself by telling yourself, “I never give up.”

Before you can achieve anything worthwhile in life, you have to pass “the persistence test.” This is usually a “snap quiz” sprung on you unexpectedly with no warning. You suddenly face a major setback, problem, temporary failure, or even a complete disaster. When this happens, remind yourself that this is the “testing time.” This is when you demonstrate what you are really made of. This is when you show yourself and others the strength of your character and your true determination to succeed.

YOUR ABILITY TO

RESPOND

Your ability to respond effec­tively to setbacks—your level of “response-ability”—is the mea­sure of your readiness to succeed. When you experience a major setback or problem, you will feel temporarily astounded. This feeling is very much like a punch in the “emotional solar plexus.” You will be stopped for a few seconds or a few minutes. During this period, you will often feel discouraged or experience self-pity. You will say, “Why me?”

However, it is not how far you fall that counts, but rather how high you bounce. Your aim is to bounce back as quickly as possible. Resilience in the face of unexpect­ed reversals is vital to long-term success. Remember the warrior’s creed: “I will lay me down to bleed awhile, and then rise and fight again.”

Do not be surprised, shocked, or set back when things go wrong. Your best-laid plans will often fall apart. Instead, expect disappoint­ments and setbacks as a part of life. Take a deep breath, pick up the pieces, and continue onward.

OPTIMISM GIVES YOU RESILIENCE

The most important quality you need for success and persistence is optimism. This is a boundless confidence in yourself and your ability to ultimately succeed. To re­main optimistic, you must control and discipline your thinking when things go wrong. Refuse to feel sorry for yourself.

Remember, you are not a vic­tim. You are an adult, and you are in charge of your own life. You are doing what you have freely chosen to do. Setbacks come with the territory. They are merely speed bumps on the road to success.

Refuse to blame others or make excuses. When you complain or blame other people, it just makes you feel and sound petty and small, and, what is worse, it takes away your personal power. Whenever you criticize or complain, it makes you feel weaker and reduces your ability to deal effectively with the situation. Instead, greet every set­back by repeating, “I am responsi­ble.” Look for the reasons why you are responsible for what happened rather than trying to pass off the blame onto other people. No excuses.

BE PROACTIVE VERSUS REACTIVE

Resolve to focus on the solution and what can be done now, rather than on what happened and who is to blame. Think in terms of the actions you can take to re­solve the situation rather than what went wrong and who is to blame.

To remain optimistic, look for the good in every situation. When you look for something good, you will always find something good. Furthermore, while you are looking for something good, because your conscious mind can hold only one thought at a time, you will auto­matically become positive, optimis­tic, and back in full control.

Seek the valuable lesson in every problem or difficulty. Every setback you face contains one or more lessons that have been sent to you to help you be more successful in the future. Tracy opines that the difference between successes and failures is simple: “Failures feel sorry for themselves when things go wrong, whereas successful people look for the valuable lesson they can learn that will help them in the future.”

LOOK FOR THE GIFT

Normal Vincent Peale used to say, “When God wants to send you a gift, he wraps it up in a problem. The bigger the gift that God wants to send you, the bigger the prob­lem he wraps it up in.”

Instead of concentrat­ing on the problem, look for the GIFT. Wonderfully enough, you will always find it. What is more, sometimes the gift, or valuable lesson, can be of far greater value than the cost of the problem itself. Sometimes, one lesson that you learn in dealing with a problem can be the key to your long-term success. As Napoleon Hill wrote, “Within every problem or obstacle lays the seed of an equal or greater opportunity or benefit. Your job is to find it.”

Continually think of yourself as a strong, powerful, resolute person in the face of adversity. In World War I, a British general was de­scribed by his superiors: “There he stands, like an iron peg, driven into the frozen ground, immovable.” Let this be an accurate description of you whenever you face diffi­culties or problems of any kind. Resolve to stand like an iron peg driven into the frozen ground.

RESOLVE IN ADVANCE

When you resolve in advance that you will never give up, your success is virtually guaranteed. In the final analysis, nothing can really stop you but YOURSELF.

In life, it does not matter how many times you get knocked down. All that matters is how many times you get back up. If you continue to get back up and press onward, you must eventually reach your goal.

Each time you exert your self-discipline to persist in the face of adversity, you also increase your self-esteem and self-confidence. Then, as your self-esteem increas­es, you feel stronger, more power­ful, and more unstoppable.

When you feel better and stron­ger, you become more capable of persisting the next time—and then the time after that. By disciplining yourself to persist in the face of all adversity, you put your life onto an upward spiral of self-esteem, self-discipline, and persistence until you eventually become like a force of nature.

BY CAPT SAM ADDIAH (RTD)

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