Patience

Rome wasn’t built in a day.

Another no sh*t aphorism.

And it wasn’t built by someone who hammered a few nails one day then had some time off. Good stuff takes time and consistency. It’s crucial to know where you’re heading; a map or blueprint comes in really handy when you’re building or travelling, but the number one important step for achieving anything is daily action towards… something… even if you don’t know exactly what that is yet!

People get so hung up on goals and aims, and when they can’t identify one particular goal, think they can’t proceed.

There’s nothing wrong with not knowing what you really want, the important thing is to do something every day that makes you happy, and something most days that challenges you.

Then over time, a goal tends to identify itself. But it’s the daily creative work, like exercise, that builds up the creative muscle and always leads to something more. If you have a goal, great work towards it, but don’t be afraid to change courses if something else piques your interest.

Think of these daily actions as planting seeds and remember that the day you plant the seed is not the day you eat the fruit.

I have a friend who started going to the gym purely to lose excess weight after giving birth to her twins and quitting smoking. She wanted to get fit and feel good. She started boxing, not to be a boxer, but as part of the healthy regime. She met other women who encouraged her, and then they decided to train for a marathon. She said later, if anyone had suggested to her on that first day at the gym that she would be training for a marathon a few years later, she would have laughed her head off!

But daily steps set her on a course of action, and a goal identified itself along the way.

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I love reading on Medium. Melody Wilding wrote this wonderful brief article (gotta love the brief ones… note to self…) called The Secret Trap That’s Keeping You Stuck. I try to avoid these kinds of click-bait headlines, but I’m glad I read this one.

If you’re feeling stuck, try asking yourself these questions…

• If you change nothing, what will your life look like three months from now? How about three years from now? How does this image make you feel?
• If you were suddenly 100 per cent [happy, successful, healthy], what would you be doing differently than you are now? What would change for the worse? What would improve?
• What actions, if taken, would make you proud regardless of the outcome?
  

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Quote of the day…