Happy Memorial Day!

As we are taking the time today to remember the men and women who have given all so we can enjoy this great freedom, I hope that all of us we will continue to do our part in making the necessary sacrifices so tomorrow can be a better day for the people in our circle of influence.

In regard to The Law of Consistency as the fifth of the 15 laws of growth that John Maxwell has developed, I’m going to review with you, in four consistent days, four questions that will help you grow in consistency.

Day 1 – Monday May 27, 2019

Do you know what you need to improve?

Journalist and author George Lorimer remarked, “You’ve got to get up every morning with determination if you’re going to go to bed with satisfaction.” You can’t master anything else if you can’t master yourself.  John stated in the book, “Your future is dependent upon your personal growth. Improving yourself daily guarantees you a future filled with possibilities.”

How and where to start?  Start with the first law; The Law of Intentionality. Decide today that you are going to work on growing yourself. Next, move to The Law of Awareness which states, “You must know yourself to grow yourself.”  Use members of your family and close friends to help you in this area. Recently few people have pointed out some areas that I needed to improve. They were brutally honest with me. These people care about me.

I was in Dominican Republic few days ago. Many people from different regions in the country told me clearly, that “I need to be fluent in Spanish.” It seemed they had a meeting to talk about how they could encourage me to improve my Spanish. I have been going there since 2006. They can’t wait to see me being able to converse freely with them in their native tongue. While the feedback was direct and poignant, it left me with a sense of urgency to achieve that goal. Another business friend told me last week that I must spend more times developing my marketing skills so I can let people know how I can help them in their personal lives and businesses.

These two feedbacks were not the things that were easy for me to hear. But they were exactly what I needed to hear because they spoke to the core of 2 areas I needed to improve. Why are they important to me?  It is because I value people and I want to add value to people. I am now working on the rule of 20 hours. I am devoting 20 hours of consistent and intensive effort every day to each task (six days a week, 30 minutes a day) working on my Spanish and learning new things about marketing. I also developed a process to do that.

E. M. Gray said, “The successful person has the habit of doing the things that failures don’t like to do. The successful person doesn’t like doing them either, but his dislike is subordinated to the strength of his purpose.” John added, “The more tuned you are to your purpose, and the more dedicated you are to growing toward it, the better your chances of reaching your potential, expanding your possibilities, and doing something significant.”

Consistency Requires Sacrifices

Personal Example: This past weekend, I made an attempt to post pictures on Instagram and Pinterest. I realized again that I am not good at doing these tasks. I don’t even like to do them. The dislike makes it more difficult to want to improve in these areas. The above quote speaks to me. I must change if I am to find ways to help these children in that orphanage.

I just got back from the DR. I have beautiful pictures I could share, not to brag about myself, but to show the impact the excursionists that went with me had on the people they served. I must develop a plan and dedicate time (part of the 20 hours on marketing) to take a course on Instagram and Pinterest for dummies.

Do you know what you need to improve? Decide today that you’re going to be intentional about finding out what you need to improve. Listen to feedback that your friends, customers, vendors and others are giving you. Identify one or two areas you need to improve. Make a plan. Start small. Apply consistent and intensified effort for a very specific time. Do that until you see the growth you are looking for. Be patient while being consistent. Remember that, “Growth doesn’t happen automatically.” “Motivation gets you going—Discipline keeps you growing.”