Why I Failed to Be Consistent and What I Will Do to Stay Consistent

Why I failed to be consistent and what I will do to stay consistent

I struggled with getting consistent in creating and posting on social media and the blog.

Even after I succeeded in getting consistent enough, the rules changed; I felt I needed to do more to get results

Now I have to post more and create more, which made my brain spiral into all the doubts and sabotage.

Sometimes it’s disguised as perfectionism, overwhelm, tiredness, overcomplicating, not enough time, i don’t know enough,

I’ll do it when i learn enough,what is the point, I can’t do it, procrastination,…etc

So, i am well deep into it and i know from experience how difficult consistency can be, especially if you compare it or

tried to push beyond what your mind can handle

This post is my hope to give awareness, make you feel not alone, help you get accountable and leave you with tips that I will try and you could too

What you’ll learn:

• 9 reasons we fail to be consistent
• 6 lessons I learned from my failure
• My plan: 5 ways to stay consistent

Why I failed to be consistent

Note: I will share everything in the context of being consistent in creating and posting on social media and the blog

1-seeing it as hard and difficult

I think it is a way for my brain to avoid doing uncomfortable things that challenge who I am.

In this case, this is hard, and i don’t do hard things

And i found that this line of thinking of complicating things is a pattern that is repeated in many aspects of my life

Like when i want to do strength training mobility workout daily, I find myself defaulting to these thoughts and end up not doing either one 

2-not believing and following the system I created

I have a workflow for writing blog posts and a template for writing short content

But once in a while i find myself trying to search for ways to do it better, which sounds nice and why not optimize,right!!?

but i do that from feeling that what i do isn’t enough, isn’t good, isn’t right, which leads to distraction and lack of progress 

3-doubting my ability to create and what i create

Imagine feeling doubt at least every other time i create,it is not fun or encouraging?!

Especially if you let it run wild and you sink with it, which is what i did and do

Learning to be aware of it and let it be and not try to resist or change it but accept as something going and si happening

and still do it anyway and reminding myself that it doesn’t matter if what i create it isn’t good; it will get good as i do more

4-mentally spiraling into I can’t, i don’t know,all the thoughts that downgrade me and what i do

I think this comes from fear and doubt of course which is a way for my brain to protect me from doing something that isn’t safe.

and when it is a mental habit or response to fear and doubt i learned to be safe

The key thing here is knowing my core issue not the symptoms

the issue as I diagnosed is lack of self belief , confidence,trust, esteem, and low self worth

So, instead of wasting my time treating symptoms I will work on changing those using books, methods I learned,..

5-lack of self-belief and trust in myself to be able to do it and low self esteem

There is always this voice of doubt and demeaning voice that surfaces when i try to create or do anything that is deemed in my mind big

this voice puts me down,no matter what I do if I learn a language, it says like you’re the only one who have done it,

if i wrote a post it says I’m sure it’s not that good, there are others better…

it’s something i need to change not by force, resistance, or pushing things away but awareness, acceptance, feeling and learning other things to do that

6-comparing myself

you can’t escape it if you are on social media and if you listen to gurus. you constantly feel behind; you are not doing enough.

Sure, we need to keep up with the updates and changes happening in whatever spaces we work in whether that content creation or else

but, we shouldn’t forget that there are always those fundamental things that don’t change and we need to focus on them first

then follow the new changes while looking after our minds and emotions, because they interfere all the time in whatever you do

instead work with yourself and be on your side by looking after it first, then doing whatever work for both of you, the operating version and the director version

ask yourself what would work for me, what is best for me, what i can do?

7-aiming high before making the identity change(trying to optimize so soon)

I aimed to post daily on social media and once per week on the blog.

It was hard and impossible in my mind, and I kept pushing with no success. I couldn’t do it

It felt like too much for me to do so i failed to stay consistent

and was swinging between being consistent for a while and falling off for another while

8-upgrading too fast: trying to optimize without considering my brain screams

When I managed to be consistent on doing 3 posts per week and 1 blog post every other week or so.

I felt I needed to do more because that’s what you hear: you need to create more and show up more to get noticed,

to build something, because of AI or whatever new thing comes up

I am not saying this is wrong or right but my brain couldn’t follow, which left me stuck (couldn’t mentally do more),

which led to all-or-nothing thinking that led to abandoning things altogether and going back to things being haphazard 

9-always thinking there’s a better thing out there I could do

Always feeling short that there is more i can do , I can do better, my plan needs constant improvement,

There’s a better way and my own is not it…

Which led to my failure to be consistent and seeing that these thoughts come from a lack of self-belief and

giving greater importance to other people’s”experts” on the internet and elsewhere, and falling for their marketing and selling tactics

That one thing that kept me feeling not enough, even if what i do is working for me despite what others say, because i gave others more importance than myself

Yes, one should learn and better themselves, but not all the time and not at the expense of their own self-trust,

autonomy, and confidence, because that turns from growing to putting yourself down, which is not growth

What I learned from my failure to be consistent

1-there’s no switch you could turn that would turn everything right

It will take training, practice, and changing mental beliefs and identity 

2-it requires repetition 

Working on your thoughts and self-image, and working on creating the content, or else

requires working on them and new ways, etc., repeatedly

3-pushing is a burnout waiting to happen

Pushing yourself to do anything without consideration

it will only lead to burnout and stress

4-work with yourself, not against it(accept yourself)

5-it’s okay for you not to have new things to share; you can share a different angle for the same thing

6-awareness of the thoughts and beliefs holding you back is the start

What will I do to stay consistent (simple plan)

1-working on and becoming aware of my thoughts and feelings

The easiest ways are:

1-journaling: writing my thoughts down so as my feelings when i have them and trying to understand, sympathize and work with myself

2-in my mind: becoming aware and accepting by letting them be, and if i need to direct them, i would do it with kindness 

2-changing my identity following this post

Using self-image affirmations that is followed by actions that prove it

I don’t mean the meaningless positive phrases you find online;

what I mean creating a specific layered self-image to change your self-belief gradually

That starts with what you can believe you can be now to cause No resistance in your mind; then as you act accordingly,

then upgrade it until you reach the self-image you want

Learn how and more here How To Shift Your Identity To Reach Your Goal

How To Create Your Affirmations: The Complete Guide

How To Change Your Beliefs (rewrite your negative stories)

3-collaborating with myself

Is a parenting technique used with stubborn children to change their behaviors(learned it from this video) 

Use it when you have to do something but hate doing it, instead of forcing or being authoritative,

you come from the angle of working with yourself(what can we do about it?

 it is about accepting and working with myself(Us against the problem)

For me, writing blog posts means; Not forcing myself to finish it in a day or two but in small increments before the deadline,

and gradually increasing what i do by adopting the mentality” one more thing to do before I finish for today,” until maybe writing a whole blog post in a day

Here is how to do it:

1-self-empathy(what’s going on here?why this feel hard for you? How does that make you feel?

2-why is it still important to make this change 

3-how do i come up with a plan that is self-empathetic? that keeps me in mind, feels realistic for me, and addresses what i hard for me?

4-Reminding myself that change takes time and requires practice, including changing my thoughts and mental patterns

5-follow the system i have now, which is

for publishing blog posts

I divide the work into different days: research and coming up with ideas and writing/creating

i have a detailed workflow that i use on those days

for content creation on social media, mainly X

-I save ideas and thoughts as i come across them

-use the template to plan and batch coming up with ideas and selecting formats to write them in

and batch or write day by day

6-set deadlines that don’t make my brain go crazy

i am thinking of publishing every Thursday

7-start small and grow with my mind, not the platforms

post the number and times that i can without driving my mind into chaos, which is for now

2 blog posts per month, 4-5 posts on social media, and not increase that until this becomes part of what I do regularly;

Maybe increase that gradually or find a way to make it automatic

Conclusion

Failure in being consistent is a direct result of your unmanaged mind

Your mind creates blocks and hurdles to stop you from doing anything that’s uncomfortable,

scary, out of habit, and who you are.

That’s why you need to treat consistency as a mental problem,

because when you do that, you’ll focus on the real issue and then can solve it 

Because that’s what is truly making you stuck in failure

The more you keep responding to the feeling of discomfort with distraction and the harder you get stuck

Comment: do you struggle to be consistent or did you? How did you solve it? Share for all of us to learn from each other 

You’ve read Why I failed to be consistent and what I will do to stay consistent

Wishing you the best

wafaa