“It’s easy to start, everyone can do it. Be the one who finishes” – Anonymous
Have you ever been so excited to go on an
adventure that you and your friends eagerly talked about it in a chat group
only to have it cancelled the last minute?
Have you ever tried joining a full marathon only
to fail halfway as the ambulance carried your ass to the hospital?
Have you ever signed up for an annual membership
in a gym but failed to show up in the last 3 months?
We are so good at planning things, ecstatic at how
fun the world can turn out and always eager to try something new… but that’s all we ever did. We get excited so we plan, we try but we never follow through. At least
most of us don’t.
“TO FINISH”
- is
defined by Merriam-Webster Dictionary as “to come to an end of a course, task,
or undertaking”.
There’s this word that most of us often neglect:
END. To finish something means not only to carry out something but to end something. So if you are good at starting but unable to
finish, here are my 5 tips.
HOW DO I FINISH?
1-Build a habit
Thanks to the most powerful part of the body – the
brain. For everything that we do, when done as a habit, makes everything less
if not at all, taxing to the brain. Or this
is what I would simply call automatic. We want “automatic” installed in our
senses for us to be able to finish our goals, whatever they may be. To
illustrate: When you just started learning how to drive, you had to think of a
few things carefully like how to put your hands on the steering wheel, what
gear you needed to switch to when you park and drive, and how much pressure you
need to apply to the pedal when accelerating and going on a full stop. These at
the time were new things that your brain needed to process and as a result, they
required more attention and they needed more “memory usage” (like a smartphone).
The particular part of the brain that fires up
like New Year’s eve is the basal ganglia. But as you repeat the process over and more
frequently, the brain interprets it as nothing new. (Brain: “Hey you did that 5
times a couple days ago. No worries, I already have that information stored for
you.”) That’s how you can drive home drunk as hell at 5AM in one piece, without remembering it the next day (Disclaimer: I am not an advocate of drunk driving). And that's why it is so
easy for runners to break a sweat regardless of how tired they are from work (or
business or whatever they do for a living). They have already formed a habit of
putting on their favorite running shoes as soon as they see the sunset through the windows.
2-Sharpen
your mental toughness
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| source: http://www.itennis.in |
An aspiring marathon runner would think that
running a full marathon (42km) is all about physical endurance. And he couldn’t
be more wrong. Running a full marathon that takes somewhere from 4 to 8 hours of non-stop
inhaling and exhaling through your mouth, ain't a walk in the park. Sure, you
have to have proper training but the regimen is only there to make sure you
avoid injuries. But every runner I have come to talk to swears on the same thing - it is not a running game but a mental battle.
3-Picture
the finish line in your head
This has been the keystone habit of one of, if
not the greatest Olympic athlete that has ever lived. Before the day ends and what
seems to be an endless training for Michael Phelps, he does a mental
visualization of the perfect race. In bed, he would imagine himself swimming
flawlessly past all his competitors, with great emphasis on his stroke and
turns, his breathing and how he would face the crowd upon inevitable victory.
He would do this countless times every night until each detail of the race is
played perfectly in his head, developing a movie in his mind. Or what his coach would say, the “videotape”. The
next thing he knows, he breaks record after record winning gold after the
other. And to him, he was just playing the videotape.
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| screen grab from http://www.gettyimages.com/ |
4-Have patience
"If a string is in a knot, patience will untie it.
Patience can do lots of things, have you ever tried it?"
- Anna M. Pratt
Greatness takes time. Triumphant is the one who reaches the top, no matter how long. There is no overnight success here - whether in business, career or relationship, hardships will come along, obstacles will come right at you with a blink of an eye and you better come prepared. Without patience, the thing you have been working hard your whole life will vanish in an instant. As you run your own race, it is inevitable you will hit a wall. However you decide to pass that wall is up to you. Some work around it, others climb it and there are a few who break through it. Whatever you do, don't stare on the wall.
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| screen grab from: http://ftw.usatoday.com/ |
5-Fail and
try again
Champions aren’t easy nuts to crack. They have a
relentless attitude, a no-quitting mindset and are focused on producing results that set them apart from everyone
else. They have habits that are ingrained in their wires, they are committed to their dream and are mentally sound
like no other. They put their plans into massive action. They have practiced a million times what they are set to
achieve and have already lived in their heads the winning experience before you even thought
of competing. However, most of us only see their success when they’re already
on the big screen. We only hear about them when they are already mentioned on
the radio. What most of us don’t see are
their failures, the walls that they have been hit by over and over, the blood
sweat and tears that were poured in their lifetime of tremendous perseverance and dedication. We only see the tip of the
iceberg. And yes, problems arise, and they fail. But when they do, they do it quickly and bounce back even faster.
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| Arnold Schwarzenegger - source: http://iluvesports.com/ |
You see doing the first 4 things won’t make you finish
your ultimate goal if you can’t accept failure. Remember that failure is
inevitable as death, but when you change your perspective and learn from the outcome, when you figure out how to utilize and rebound from failure only
will you rise from unimaginable depths.
