It started with Brad Issac.
He was a young comedian who had just begun his career in the world of comedy. One evening, he ended up at a club where Jerry Seinfeld was performing.
Isaac later recounted what took place when he encountered Seinfeld backstage and asked if he had “any tips for a young comic?”
He said the way to be a better comic was to create better jokes and the way to create better jokes was to write every day.
He told me to get a big wall calendar that has a whole year on one page and hang it on a prominent wall. The next step was to get a big red magic marker. He said for each day that I do my task of writing, I get to put a big red X over that day.
“After a few days you’ll have a chain. Just keep at it and the chain will grow longer every day. You’ll like seeing that chain, especially when you get a few weeks under your belt. Your only job is to not break the chain.”
Why Jerry Seinfeld
I am sure all of you have heard of the sitcom Seinfeld. Jerry Seinfeld is the co-creator and co-writer of Seinfeld.
He is renowned as one of Comedy Central’s “Top 100 Comedians of All-Time,” and holds an esteemed position in the entertainment industry.
During the pinnacle of his earnings in 1998, he was earning $267 million in a single year! A YEAR!
Seinfeld was a phenomenon in the US and was so successful NBC was prepared to offer Jerry Seinfeld $5m per episode to continue. In fact, the cast of Friends was earning “just” $1m per episode at the height of their success.
I can’t even imagine earning $1m and the reason behind that is that I have never done the amount of work it requires to earn this much money. I have never shown the amount of consistency it needs to build a career this magnificent.
So, why Jerry Seinfeld? Because of all this. And what truly distinguishes Jerry Seinfeld is his unwavering consistency.
And I am sure he has many other qualities that set him apart from the crowd. His success speaks for itself. But the consistency part is very visible. And this is something we can develop in ourselves.
But it’s easier said than done.
Where We Stand
If you’re reading this, you want to change.
The first thing that I did, and you also need to do, is have a good look at yourself. Not in the mirror, but in your mind.
Now, imagine your goals. What do you want to achieve? And what kind of person do you think can achieve these goals?
For example, I want to be fit and lose weight. And I know that a person who is fit prioritizes exercise, eats clean, stays active, and shows consistency and patience.
Contrast that with our own experiences.
Are you doing all the things you need to do to achieve your goal? Don’t give excuses. I am sure you don’t have time. But the point remains, are you doing everything you need to do?
If the answer is no, then you can never achieve these goals.
We yearn to create, yet often struggle to do so. We want to exercise but struggle to find motivation. We want to accomplish our goals, yet for some strange reason, we succumb to procrastination.
What Changed?
I started hating myself in the last few months.
I hated I couldn’t even make time to write for half an hour every day. I hated I was not prioritizing my health, my dreams, and my goals. I was wasting the precious time I had watching TV series, and movies and reading fictional books.
And I was not even happy. I was sad and depressed almost all the time.
That’s when I knew it was time for a change. And that’s what I have been trying to do. I was pretty consistent last year. I was handling two YouTube channels, writing, coding and so on. But last December, I said goodbye to YouTube because it was not for me. Maybe I’ll get back to it someday but with a different niche.
Then I got sick, and my writing took a hit.
And after getting up, even though I was writing, I was not writing consistently. So, I started the 90-day challenge on 2nd April, and today is day 16.
So, I’m doing all these things every day:
Writing
Reading
Learning something new (right now, it’s copywriting)
Meditation
Exercise + walks
No social media
And I tracked my improvement. I made plans and then made sure I followed these plans.
I love it.
Why It Works
If you want to be successful in any field, show up day after day, delivering your best. Most people around you are not doing this simple thing. They are not working towards their dreams, and they want you to stay with them.
There will always be distractions and urgent situations in your life. There will never be a perfect time to start, and that’s why you have to decide what you want your future to look like and take steps accordingly.
For me, the hard part was not starting, it was to keep going. I was like most people. I would lose motivation and give up after simply a bad day at work. If I failed at any task, I would immediately stop working and waste days watching TV and eating.
But unlike us, the top performers swiftly return to their routine the next day, undeterred.
And that’s why this strategy works. It shifts the focus away from results to the process itself. It means that it doesn’t matter how bad I wrote, or how many views I get. What matters is I write every day.
The process is now more important than the results.
It’s not about how inspired or motivated you feel, nor is it about the brilliance of your work at that moment. Instead, the sole aim is to “not break the chain.”
And it’s so easy to start. All you need is a calendar and a commitment to start your own chain.
Consistency Over Intensity
Start small.
When I started, my goal was to write for just 15 minutes a day. When I got the hang of it, I changed it. Slowly. 15 minutes changed to 30 and now, I work as per the word count.
Mostly, it’s for the days you don’t feel motivated to do the work. Otherwise, when you sit down to do the work, you’ll not stop just because your daily quota is reached. On good days, I can write for 3 to 4 hours.
Just choose a task that is simple enough to sustain. Simultaneously, it must be meaningful enough to yield results.
For example, just writing won’t do me any good. I have to publish the work as well. So, when I say write, I also mean edit and publish. I forgot to do that in the beginning and I saw no improvement in my results.
Writing, even in small increments, can produce meaningful outcomes if you put your work out in the open.
Also, because I want to improve my health, reading blogs and watching videos on how to stay healthy or lose weight will not help me unless I do the work myself.
So, the task is to exercise.
Select tasks that are easy to maintain and capable of generating the desired outcome.
Takeaway
I thought it would take herculean efforts to keep up with my goals but I was wrong. You just need to stay dedicated to small, manageable tasks. Do these tasks every day for the rest of your life, and in a few years, you’ll be unrecognizable.
Your life will change for the better.
And by maintaining consistency in your pursuits, results will come more swiftly.
Unwavering consistency is what you need to build your dream life. Start today and don’t break the chain.
Want to be a writer but don’t know where to start? Get your free copy of Beginner’s Guide To Writing on Medium. Also, say hi on Twitter.
I’ll see you next week,
S
❄️ Published this week on Medium
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