How to stay motivated and practice consistently?
Whether you want to show up on your mat, meditate, floss or write 500 words a day, staying consistent is a major and all too common challenge for most of us.
Staying motivated and consistent is the unsexy secret to being successful with pretty much anything in life — from your practice to your health, work and relationships.
So if you’ve broken your commitment with yourself all too often, here are some helpful tips to outsmart your brain and systematically develop this most essential, and least taught, skill.
Motivation resembles a curve.
And eventually every curve will turn downward.
So, we don’t recommend committing to a particular routine or new habit at the peak of your motivation which is usually when you just start out with bucket loads of enthusiasm. Aka right after the weekend workshop, consultation or self-help book.
Wait a little. Commit when you are at the bottom of the motivational curve.
Start small.
Precisely when you are at the bottom of your motivational curve, you can realistically commit to 5min of breathing or meditating.
Starting small with just 5min seems too easy and therefore is easily underappreciated. But it’s exactly how professional athletes and world-class performers build long-term commitment and follow-through.
What are you already doing? - Connect your new habit to that.
Science is showing that the easiest way to create any new habit is to connect it with something you are already doing. That could mean 5min of stretching in your piyamas in the kitchen while your morning coffee is brewing. The coffee-making ritual turns into a trigger for your new habit.
Rewards matter.
Say you’ve worked out for 5min on the kitchen floor, savouring your morning coffee afterwards could be your reward.
Remember: All change is hard at the beginning, messy in the middle and beautiful at the end. It will get easier!
To help you further stay on course we put together a Consistency Checklist below. If your struggle persists, get in touch.
Consistency Checklist
Is your practice aligned with your natural inclinations? I.e. if you prefer a walking meditation over a sitting one, do that!
Is your practice another long to-do list? — Simplify.
Be like the marathon runner — save energy early on. Because, initial enthusiasm can rarely be sustained.
Whenever we recommend a practice to clients, we ask them how much time they have available in a day. If their response is “an hour”, we tell them: "Start with 5min.” — Start small.
There will be times when you don't feel like it. — Just do it.
Stick to the same time and place, roughly.
Practice without expecting results.
Honour the commitment you made with yourself.
Celebrate your wins. I.e. for each day you practiced put a coffee bean into a large jar for visual feedback.
Do you have a break from your practice once or twice a week? Make breaking the routine part of the routine.
Practicing with a scattered attention is the practice of a beginner no matter how difficult the practice.
Once you’ve been consistent for a while, beware of drifting into auto-pilot. Keep showing up with a beginners mind.
When your regularity is broken, treat it like a fresh start. If guilt arises, watch that too.
