I’m not sure who needs to hear this, but there’s no shortcut to success. Since we live in an instant gratification society, mainstream messaging loves to bombard us with the idea that success can happen overnight. Just make a social media video go viral and, you too, can be successful. Being raised on fairytale franchises hasn’t helped either (side-eyeing a certain corporation whose mascot is a mouse). We love the fairytale idea of overnight success. Unfortunately, it’s just that – a fairytale. And when it doesn’t happen that way for us, we think we’re doing something wrong or have failed. If you’re working towards something and it’s taking you awhile to succeed, don’t be discouraged because there’s no shortcut to success. Success not only takes time, but a few other things:
Courage
Success takes courage. When you’re trying to make something happen and you’re not 100% sure it’ll be successful, it takes courage to push forward anyway. Pursuing success isn’t for the faint of heart – it will push you outside of your comfort zone. It takes courage to trade comfort for the uncertain.
Discipline
Success also requires discipline. Since success doesn’t happen overnight, you have to have the discipline to continue to keep going until you’ve reached your goal. During your journey you’ll be faced with disappointment, distractions, detours and delays. You have to have the discipline not to allow any of those things to stop you and to keep working your plan until you succeed.
Consistency
Consistency is another necessary key for success. Again, success doesn’t happen over night so you have to be consistent in applying your plan. Sporadic, inconsistent effort won’t get you where you’re trying to go. It’s what you do consistently that’ll help you succeed.
Patience
You’ll need a great deal of patience in pursing success. Again, contrary to what mainstream messaging wants us to believe, success takes time. So, while your doing all the things you have to be patient and wait for your efforts to pay off vs. quitting when things don’t happen quickly. I’m sure we’ve all heard the saying that a farmer doesn’t plant seeds one day and go out looking for a harvest the next. That same principle applies to success. You have to be patient and wait for the seeds you’ve planted to bare fruit. It won’t happen instantly, but it will happen eventually so be patient.
The next time someone tries to sell you on overnight success…
Flexibility
Pursuing success also requires flexibility. Why? Just like there’s no shortcut to success, there’s no one-way to achieve it. Yes, by all means, create a plan to get you to your end goal. However, be flexible on how you get there. Along the way you’ll encounter the unforeseen and unexpected so be willing to make adjustments as needed.
Resilience
Resilience is another key element you’ll need on your way to success. Chances are, you’re going to fail, face the unexpected and make a bunch of mistakes along the way. When this happens you’ll be tempted to throw in the towel and quit. You have to be able to roll with the punches, make your necessary adjustments and keep it moving.
Faith
Finally, but most importantly, success requires faith. When you’re trying to accomplish something new and you don’t have any guarantees that it’ll happen, you have to have faith to believe that if you don’t quit, success is inevitable. Most of the times it will be your faith that carries you along when things are going wrong, nothing seems to be working or you feel like quitting. Faith is probably the most underrated and often overlooked key to success.
What are some other keys to success? Drop a comment below.
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