Viewers of the 2022 Winter Olympics may have seen a new face on Team USA’s cross-country skiing team, Olympian Rosie Brennan. In the 2015 Olympics, Brennan was cut from the team due to a series of injuries. In the 2018 games, she was out with mononucleosis, and she wouldn’t discover the cause of this fatigue until months later. Although Brennan considered retiring from the sport after these setbacks, she kept working towards her goals to finally make her Olympic debut this year.
So what sets an Olympian like Brennan apart from everyone else? What can you learn from Brennan’s story? Perseverance. Perseverance is absolutely essential if you want to achieve your goals and live out your mission. Take note of these ten ways to access perseverance in your life.
- Grit–The Mindset
When you want to achieve something, it always comes down to having the proper mindset. If you want to persevere, the proper mindset necessary for success is grit.
Individuals who demonstrate desire and persistence possess grit. They overcome obstacles and distractions effectively. They can self-regulate and postpone their need for positive reinforcement and gratification to continue working diligently on a task. Grit keeps you going against the odds and, even more importantly, against your own limiting beliefs.
- Purpose
If you want to stay on track with your goals, your best ally is a very strong purpose. Your purpose helps you match your goal with a spiritual or emotional need as well as a strong why. It is your sense of purpose that fuels you as you overcome obstacles and drives you towards goal achievement. As long as you keep your purpose mindfully in front of you, it will serve to rekindle your energy over time and help you persevere.
- Passion and Desire
Passion and desire propel you to action. Desire is a strong and compelling wish, yearning, or desperation for something. If you have a strong desire to achieve a goal, perseverance is easy. Perseverance helps you “satisfy” your desire by achieving your goal.
- Discipline
Discipline is synonymous with willpower. It takes willpower to stick to your goals and maintain the daily habits you need to achieve them.
As you work towards your goals, there will be days when you feel no passion for them at all. In order to achieve your goals and mission, you will still need to take action regardless of how you are feeling from moment to moment. Discipline — consistent discipline — is integral to the art of perseverance.
Discipline is what makes an Olympic athlete get up early in the morning for practice. It’s why Olympians continue to fuel their bodies with healthy nutritional choices rather than junk food. It keeps them consistently going to the gym to keep their strength up.
Habits are an extension of willpower and, as such, are an essential aspect of perseverance. By consistently maintaining your habits, you create your own reality.
If you make healthy choices day after day, your body will respond positively. Whether you are an athlete, artist, businessperson, teacher, or student, your habits drive your life.
- Focus
Keeping your eyes firmly on the prize is a crucial component of perseverance. In this age of technology, it is becoming increasingly difficult for anyone to stay focused on any goal due to increasingly abundant distractions.
The entire world is vying for your focus. Companies spend billions of dollars to get you to focus on what they are trying to sell you. While most people intend to complete their goals, many become distracted by the newest “shiny object” that a company happens to be advertising.
Remember that energy flows where focus goes. You want to spend your energy on your goals and mission, not somebody else’s.
The highest level of focus is the flow state. If you can enter into this state, perseverance becomes a non-issue. You literally “flow to your goals,” making this the most productive zone for your achievements.
Athletes pursue a flow state because it typically allows them to achieve the highest level of performance with the least amount of effort. They can tune distractions out and channel all their energy into the sport.
- Energy
You cannot persevere without energy. Sleep, nutrition, and exercise are crucial to maintaining a healthy brain and state of mind. Meditation is likely the most important activity you can do to build and maintain a healthy state of mind, and it has endless cross-functional benefits in all of your domains.
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To persevere, you must maintain personal accountability. Accountability is a crucial component of perseverance, and many people who want to accomplish major goals will need the help of others along the way.
What is the best tool for personal accountability? A coach.
- Stress
How you respond to stress is a major factor that affects perseverance. Do you shy away from stress? Does it break you, or does it build you up?
Research shows that your mindset about the impact of stress determines whether it benefits or harms you. If you use it properly, stress can be an effective tool for perseverance and achievement.
- Adaptability
Adaptability is another key attribute of perseverance. Think of what would happen if professional athletes weren’t versed in adaptability? The first thing that went wrong in a game or match would derail them. Adaptability helps them persevere toward their goals regardless of what their opponents throw at them.
How comfortable do you feel adjusting to changing circumstances? With adaptability, you can make progress on your goals despite changes, and, sometimes, you can even find a way to capitalize on these changes to improve your chances of success in reaching a goal.
The difference between achieving or not achieving a goal could be how you respond to new circumstances.
- Obsession
Beyond surviving, you want to succeed. While many people believe that obsession has a negative connotation, there is an enormous benefit to it.
People who are obsessed with a goal tend to be able to access the deepest resources within and without themselves to accomplish it. More importantly, they can access these resources with excitement and joy as they pursue their goals.
Obsession only becomes a problem when you live your entire life in that obsessive state without balance. If you incur greater emotional, spiritual, or physical costs from an obsession than benefits, the obsession is unhealthy.
The Bottom Line
Perseverance is absolutely essential if you want to achieve your goals and live out your mission. You can use all the success strategies in the world, but if you can’t persevere, you will never accomplish your goal. The good news is that perseverance is like a muscle that gets stronger the more you use it.
To learn more about using perseverance to achieve your goals, make sure you’ve downloaded The 10 Step Arootah Success Formula here.
How are you developing perseverance? Let us know in the comments!
Sources
https://olympics.com/en/news/rosie-brennan-persistence-pays-off-ahead-of-beijing-2022
https://www.podiumsportsjournal.com/2010/10/01/how-to-achieve-the-flow-state-in-athletics-and-life/
I love the tip about passion helping you persevere! This is what keeps me going on my goals when I face obstacles.