15 Top Habits That Will Develop Your Persistence Muscle

For a successful and happy life, you need to build as many great habits as you possibly can, while eliminating the bad ones. Think about you trying to build an online business, to provide a new type of lifestyle for your family. While you are building new habits, you have a few nasty ones hanging in the closet…like hitting the casino every Friday night. As your business brings money in the front door, you throw it out the back door. For your success, you need to be very persistent and develop a, “I will never, ever quit,” attitude.

The following top 15 habits will pump you up and help your growth. Read each one carefully and start putting them into action today!

Build a positive mental attitude, also known as PMA. A positive mental attitude will help you when life tries to tie a heavy metal anchor around your neck and pull you down. There are a large number of ways to build a positive mental attitude. One main idea is to practice gratitude daily. Be thankful for everything in your life. This means being grateful not only for the big things like the love of a significant other but also for what you would consider the little things like clean water and good food. You know that millions of people do not have what you do. Don’t take it for granted. When someone does you a small kindness, don’t shrug it off as insignificant. Be grateful that person went out of their way to show you some love. There are several books that you can read on PMA.
The 1st one on your list is “Success Through a Positive Mental Attitude”, by Napoleon Hill and W. Clement Stone. This classic book is written by two powerhouses who were considered to be among the most successful people in the world at their time. This is filled with timeless wisdom and you will love it and likely read it multiple times.
The ability to adjust and adapt is a habit everyone needs. Things are going to change and you need the mental strength to alter your vision or goal to get around the roadblock. You will also be hit with negativity from areas that you least expect. This is the time to learn how to have the flexibility of bamboo. In a heavy storm, a regular tree may bend and crack. Bamboo is super flexible and can withstand tremendous gales. When the negativity tries to bowl you over and make you quit, be calm and flexible. Adjusting course slightly to get outside the negativity may be the best option at times.
Make lifelong learning a habit. In the course of achieving your goals and not quitting, the more information you have at your fingertips, the easier it is to get to the goal line. A lack of information will cause struggles and this is where persistence slows down and in some cases disappears. Building a library is something everyone should do, whether it is physical or digital books. There will be times when you need a bit of information or even motivation and having a library puts it right at your fingertips.
Find a role model. Be in the habit of looking for different types of role models. You can model people for their work ethic or even their relationship-building skills. The best role models are the ones you can talk to and ask questions to discuss how they think and what their beliefs are.
Be in the habit of creating goals and adjusting as needed. Using 90-day goals, combined with the S.M.A.R.T method is excellent for setting and achieving goals. If you are in the habit of reading your main goals daily, then the idea of quitting becomes foreign because the excitement level stays high.
Also develop the habit of saying, “No.” Many people will try to waste your time, either intentionally or unintentionally. Saying “No,” politely but firmly and keeping your head down while taking massive action will lead to success.
Even people with good self-confidence can take a hit that hurts. It’s a great habit to work on your self-confidence to keep it razor-sharp. You will not quit when you remind yourself that your confidence is five stars. Daily self-confidence reminders can be done by repeating a simple affirmation before sitting down to work. Try something like repeating, “I am unstoppable,” at least 50 times before you even boot up your computer. If you want to work on it daily, you can also put your headphones on while you work. No, you won’t be playing the latest in hip-hop. J You will be playing a subliminal MP3 on self-confidence. While you work away, pleasing music will be playing lightly, with words of self-confidence embedded deep in the music. This allows the self-confidence phrases, to go deep into your subconscious mind without being blocked by your conscious mind. Hearing a self-confident phrase gives you a chance to play the negative and say, “That’s not me.” This is something you want to avoid altogether and not allow yourself to debate yourself on the level of your self-confidence.
Have you ever heard people complain about the “drama on Facebook?” It does sometimes get overwhelming and doing Facebook should only be for business purposes. When you want to have the habit of pushing forward and never quitting, you need to avoid negativity altogether. Join business groups on Facebook or start your own. If you find the group owner is not strict on the rules of the group, then leave it. Getting sucked into arguments drains your positive energy. Outside of social media, you need to guard against the drama as well. Find ways to politely excuse yourself from family arguments and co-workers who want to bring you into their confidence. If that person can transfer some of their sadness to you, it makes them feel better.
Find or build a community of persistent people. Having 1 one-on-one mentor is wonderful but you have to remember people have a limited amount of time. Add a group of like-minded people to your persistence toolbox. Find Meetups in your area that run in the theme of persistent and never giving up. If you cannot find one, start your own and take your time growing it with the right people.
Build your habit of patience. Yes, you want to be persistent in attaining your goals but go at a steady pace and when there is resistance, find a way around it. Think of your end goals as a solid brick wall. It is built with one strong brick and good mortar, piece by piece. In the end, the brick wall will stand for many years to come. A good bricklayer takes his time and creates structures that are strong and beautiful to look at. Your big dreams and huge goals are the bricks of what you want to build for your life.
In the theme of patience, you also need to step back and relax. While persisting in reaching a goal and not quitting, you do not want to burn out. Not taking the proper break times, means you also lose your laser focus and veer off course. Once that happens you have to find your way back to the path that leads to your end goal. In talking about breaks, look at your workday. Can you work for 20-30 minutes straight and then take a five-minute break to hydrate? Your best work will get done in this way. Look at your days and weeks and see where you can schedule in the proper breaks and get in the habit of taking them. In the long run, vacations excluded, you should take 2-3 days when feasible and detox from your electronics. Your body and brain will refresh and you can come back to your workday and goals with fresh eyes.
Is your vision for your life, crystal clear? It can be if you get in the habit of creating a vision for your life and constantly reviewing and tweaking it. Your vision should include what you want not only for your personal life but business as well. It is here that you come to understand your beliefs about who you are now and who you will be in the future. The first step to having a crystal clear vision for your life is to write out a vision statement. When writing out a personal vision statement, consider it the first draft that will be edited as you grow. You always write your statement in the 1^st person as you will be reading and saying it out loud each day. It should be short and straight to the point. Here is an example, “I will live my life with honesty and integrity. My words and my actions are the building blocks to my children’s future.” To add some juice to the vision for your life, create multiple vision boards and be in the habit of looking at them every day and updating them when needed. Vision boards will help build persistence as your mind sees what you want for your life and you are putting it out to the universe. There is a connection between you and the universe and vision boards have proven to help dreams come true as the universe is aware of your desires and will help to make them come true.
A burning desire means that deep within your heart, you have dreams that must come true and you will do whatever it takes, so long as it is not harmful to others. How do you build a burning desire? You pull out all the stops and become driven to succeed no matter what. A classic example is someone who wants to stop an extremely bad habit and they put a lot of money up for grabs. They make it known to everyone that if they spot the person engaging in the bad habit, they will get a wheel barrel of cash. Imagine that the doctor says quit smoking or you die in a year. That should give you a burning desire to quit but some people are more affected by money than health. You would see burning desire if that person said, “You see me with a cigarette in my mouth, I will give you $50,000 cash.” That is a burning desire not to have to pay up and lose all that money. Another hot tip is taking immediate action. The vast majority of people will have a great idea and then think about it all the time before the idea disappears from their minds. Get in the habit of telling yourself with conviction, “Do it now!” Use this for everything from, not hitting the snooze button on the alarm, to going for a run in the rain. When you constantly use the Do It Now, phrase, it becomes an embedded habit and your persistence muscle grows like crazy.
We all run patterns of behavior. However, not all our patterns help us. For example, if you get frustrated quickly when trying to reach a goal, then you have a pattern of ultimate frustration. You may even carry it so far, as to lose your temper and become verbally abusive. When you continue to run the same destructive pattern repeatedly, it is extremely hard to stay in focus and achieve your goals. You should over the next 2-3 weeks become more self-aware of the patterns you run and then write them down. The good ones can be improved upon and the bad ones need to be changed. One way of changing a destruction pattern is to interrupt it and then run a pattern you do need. Here are a few ideas on how to do that. The 1st one will help you with your physical fitness. As soon as you start to run the frustration pattern and the idea of quitting hits your brain, jump up and scream, “Not today, not any day.” Pump your fist in the air and scream, “Drop and give me 20, soldier!” Get down on the floor and pump out 20 pushups while thinking of how someone like David Goggins refused to give up on anything, including running with fractures in his legs. Just in case 20 pushups, are not feasible because of health issues, doesn’t mean you get to keep running the frustration pattern.
Instead, you go with option number 2. When you start running that frustration pattern, get up and impersonate your favorite physical comedian. We are talking about someone who uses his body during comedy. If you have never seen some of the older comedians like Steve Martin on Saturday night, then have a look at his, “I’m a wild and crazy guy,” routine that he did with Dan Aykroyd. Study the physical moves and vocal tones they used and then copy it. Shake your body, wave your arms, and scream, “I’m a wild and crazy _______.” Your internal emotions will start to shift immediately and the good chemicals that are produced when you smile will start to flow throughout your body. Repeated use of any type of pattern interrupt will make the old pattern shrink and go away.
Your good habits must be highly developed for your persistent attitude to flourish. When you allow doubt to creep into your mind, it is like a bit of mold on one apple. If you don’t remove that apple from the bowl, the mold will spread quickly to the other apples. You must get the highly developed habit of always thinking, “I am a winner. I will win because I have an extremely persistent attitude and quitting is not an option.” It is also very important to be 100% proactive. The companies that fail in business are the ones who do not practice this. When a problem arises and is causing serious issues, it should be dealt with the moment it sprouts. Allowing the problem to grow, means it digs in. Always be in the habit of scanning your personal and business life and spotting any issues. Then deal with it immediately. Many people regret, not being proactive when the tax due date hits and they are left scrambling.
Concerning this, focus on developing the habit of eating that really big frog. In Brian Tracy’s book, this means jumping on the biggest issue first thing in the morning and getting it out of the way. The rest of the day will have tasks and issues but since you ate that big frog already, the rest of the day is a breeze. Doing it this way will make any ideas of quitting dissolve. Many people put off the hardest thing and it wears away in the back of their minds, whispering, “This is too hard, I’ve been working all day and I can’t do anymore. Maybe I should just quit.” Do the big task first thing, when you are fresh and full of energy.
We will finish off with something that should be taught the moment we enter kindergarten and no it isn’t finger painting. We are talking about meditation. Studies have shown that children who meditate are much more relaxed and can study without getting frustrated. They have much better social skills than children who are not taught meditation and mindfulness. As adults, the ability to go deep within ourselves and see the bigger picture means the idea of quitting is not an option. We are very relaxed and focused. One only needs to look at the U.S. Open tennis tournament to see this in action. Bianca Andreescu was only nineteen years old and she defeated one of the greatest women’s tennis players ever. She credits her success to meditation. Bianca was taught how to meditate when she was very young. Her mother is a very successful businesswoman who understands the value of meditation, not only for herself but for young children. Most people believe meditation is hard and are not willing to try. This couldn’t be further from the truth. Simple meditation can be done 15 minutes a day. Once you learn how to just relax and let it flow, you can increase the time per day. The act of meditation is one of the most important skills you can learn that will keep you on the path of ultimate persistence.