In today’s busy world, instant gratification often overshadows long-term goals. However, perseverance and steadfastness in doing something despite difficulty and delays can help us to discover our potential and to build something more meaningful and long-lasting. If we can develop this valuable quality, it will impact our future careers, personal development and mental well-being in a significant way. 

One way of ensuring we maintain our focus and effort even when a project seems tough is to be able to envisage a positive outcome. Simply reminding ourselves that if we have an idea and keep working towards it we will improve and progress can provide the optimism to continue and move towards our goal.

Even if we don’t start from a position filled with optimism and self-belief, if we establish a routine and practise regularly we are sure to improve in whatever we choose to do. This could be a hobby or interest, a skill, or an area of knowledge, but whatever we decide to pursue the idea is the same, if we can study or practise in a consistent way we will take steps forward. Certainly, we don’t need to start at a high level or show natural talent. We might join a class or take lessons a couple of times a week; we might define our area of interest and form our own plan to explore it independently; or we might pick an area or skill that we are interested in as part of our future career and begin to build our knowledge and experience. If we find something that we are really interested in we might maintain our practice over a long period, maybe several years, or even decades, and this will yield results that can’t be achieved in a short time frame. This kind of long-term commitment and investment of our time will eventually make us an expert and we might be amazed by the progress we have made when we look back to the start of our journey.  

A few more tips to help us keep going: Progress isn’t always linear. This means we should be patient and not expect instant success. It may be that we practise something new for a few weeks and don’t notice any improvement, and then suddenly there is a breakthrough and it seems that we have taken several steps forward. If we don’t succeed right away we shouldn’t be discouraged, but can see setbacks as part of our development journey as they offer lessons that help us build our skills and refine our approach. Our progress will be built on many small steps. This means we don’t need to begin at a level that feels too difficult or discouraging or block out all the free time in our schedule for a single activity in our determination to master it (these are reasons that many people give up at an early stage). Instead, we can start at a level where we feel comfortable and progress gradually.

Perseverance goes hand in hand with the ability to concentrate and manage our emotions. For this reason, it is important to our well-being and is one of the greatest gifts we can have. As we develop this aspect of our character we become more calm and patient and feel our sense of capability and independence grow as we see our abilities flourish and our projects come to fruition. We gain confidence when we realise that we can control and shape our own paths, abilities and careers.

Sometimes we get the idea that success comes from natural abilities that people are simply born with, but really our qualities are not fixed or predetermined. We should start to believe that skills, abilities and ourselves are developed all the time through effort, thought and practice. Those who persevere are often the ones who achieve long-term success since they have learned to overcome obstacles and adapt to changes and challenges. With perseverance we can choose who and what we want to become.