Day 207: On Enthusiasm and Endurance
Enthusiasm is common. Endurance is rare.
In a perfect world, everyone who is pursuing their goals would be an endless source of enthusiasm for themselves and always be ready to pump themselves up when things get difficult. Unfortunately (or perhaps fortunately), life isn’t so simple.
No matter how passionate you are about your goals today, there will come a day when everything will suck and all you’ll want to do will be to give up. On that day, it won’t be feel-good enthusiasm that makes you continue. It will be dogged determination and the tenacity to finish what you begin that will carry you forward.
In a sense, enthusiasm is a fair-weather friend. By all means, you can have a great time with it when things are going well, but if you’re having problems, the only people you’ll be able to turn to would be your true friends, or in this case, perseverance.
I once spent a weekend in miserable conditions, on the brink of hypothermia, learning outdoor first aid — something I was initially enthusiastic about.
I can’t even begin to describe how tempted I was to end that torture and go back home. Nobody forced me to stay there. At any moment, I could have said that I was unwell and announced that I had to leave the camp early
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However, doing so would have been to act against my most important values and to miss out on an opportunity to instill endurance in myself. In the end, I saw it through to the end. Even though the experience was hellish, I reinforced my habit of keeping going and staying the course, even when everything inside me is screaming to let it go and quit.
To train your endurance, vow to always see things through to the end. This will help you develop an empowering habit of sticking to your resolutions, come hell or high water.