STOP telling people to JUST be consistent

STOP telling people to JUST be consistent

It’s said by the exerciser who exercise daily

It’s said by the writer who writes daily

By the planner who plans daily

It’s the well meaning advice of someone who hasn’t recognised their own struggles for consistency in some area.

I am yet to meet someone who doesn’t have a habit they know doesn’t serve them and yet they can’t stop.

To change the context.

It is to say to the anxious, just relax.

or the smoker, drinker, comfort eater, just stop.

or the overthinker, overworker, undersleeper, impostor syndrome experiencer, micro manager

“have you considered, maybe, just stopping? I did and look at me!”

… is there anything more arrogant?

It’s advice that serves ONLY to further convince them that there is something wrong with them.

It makes the anxious MORE anxious while also layering in feelings shame, being alone and a sense of incompetence on top of it.

It serves only to deepen the addiction of the smoker (insert addition here).

It doesn’t just not help, if they put any stock in your words at all it further attaches them to the struggle.

So think.

Because each time you give the advice ‘be consistent’ or any other obvious advice often indicated by the word JUST you are telling them they are in fact incompetent.

Which we all are of course in far more areas than we are not.

But we all struggle with consistency in our lives enough to know that it’s nowhere near as simple as JUST be consistent and it’s not about force either.

No amount of force or willpower will lead to consistency.

Willpower is to opposite of habit.

Here is where to start, what would be the most fun way to produce the desired outcome?