How To Stay Consistent On Your Glow Up Journey
Ph. @joannapincerato via Pinterest
What is a glow up journey?
Before we dive into the how to stay consistent on your glow up journey, let’s remind ourselves of what a glow up journey actually is. To embark on a journey of glow up means you have decided to begin the process of consciously improving yourself through various aspects of your life. This could be by overcoming bad habits to boost productivity, building new skills and competencies to increase your chances of success in your career or putting more focus on your wellbeing to find the feeling of contentment. Ultimately, the idea of glow up is that by doing the work, you consequently gain a sense of fulfilment.
What does it mean to stay consistent?
It’s one thing to start a journey of self-improvement, it’s another thing to stay consistent.
Have you ever noticed when you decide to do something you always seem to get to a certain point but never quite past it? For example, your goal is to become better at saving money, and although you’ve currently saved £500 you can never quite get past it, you want to save more, but the motivation to do so has gone, it doesn’t excite you anymore, you tell yourself a least you saved something. The same can be said for a budding entrepreneur who is great at launching businesses with great ideas, yet can never seem to get past the first year successfully.
It’s perfectly normal to feel defeated when you give something a good shot, yet it somehow feels as though there’s a glass ceiling too tough to crack.
The breakthrough you need is called ‘consistency’, however without drive and motivation, consistency cannot take you over the line.
So, how exactly can you stay consistent on your self-improvement journey? Below are a few suggestions as to how to break that glass ceiling and achieve goals you would have once deemed unimaginable.
Celebrate small wins
Make note of the progress you have already made, no matter how big or small, write it down! This could be something as small as creating an Instagram account for your business, signing up to the gym, emailing a school in regard to a course they offer, or adding £2 to your savings. Of course, it requires more than these small steps to make big changes but they are still steps, and it’s better to make small steps than none at all. A habit tracker is an effective way of monitoring your consistency and celebrating your wins along the way.
Follow social media accounts that inspire you
What you feed your mind will have an effect on the actions you take, this includes the kind of accounts you follow on social media. Whether you are conscious or unconscious of it, the impact social media has can have either a negative or positive affect on your life. I know for me personally by following the right accounts encouraged me to go to the gym more often, like literally jump out of bed and get my arse moving and change the way I was eating, it’s helped me feel better about myself both physically and mentally. Follow accounts who inspire you to continue on the path of where you want to go, if you want to be healthier, follow accounts of people who talk about healthy eating and fitness. Remember, it’s not up to the person behind the account to guide you, it’s their account, they can post what they like, it’s up to you to decide whether following them is influencing you a negative or positive way.
Understand there will be bad days
It’s important to remember there will be days where you feel that no matter how hard you try you are not making progress, this is perfectly normal. Staying consistent on your glow up journey will not be smooth sailing. The sea will get choppy and it will be challenging to want to continue particularly when it doesn’t seem as though there is light at the end of the tunnel.
Know that better days are coming and with every positive there is a negative, accept where you are right now and don’t punish yourself over it.
Revisit your list of small wins and recognise how far you have come. I’m not much of an advocate for looking back however, you never know how far you’ve come until you look back.
Remember your why
I won’t sugar coat it for you, there will one hundred per cent be days where you just don’t want to continue. You won’t want to go to the gym, you won’t want to do another day of journaling your thoughts, and you certainly won’t want another day of healthy eating. Feelings of frustration, impatience, worry and upset will certainly arise. During these moments it’s important to remember what made you start, and why you decided to improve your health, your skills and your mindset in the first place.
More tips and advice
Don’t try to do more than you can, write down ten goals you have in order of importance right now, focus only on the first two maximum. Biting off more than you can chew can lead to you feeling overwhelmed, focus on one or two goals, once you’ve achieved what you wanted, move onto the next
Get back on quickly. There will be days you fall off, you’ll skip the gym, you’ll have one too many ‘cheat’ meals, you won’t meet a deadline, the trick is not to punish yourself for missing a few days, quickly jump back on and get back on track
Don’t obsess over the outcome. The fun is in the journey, not the destination, embrace the steps you are taking to stay consistent
