Don’t be Consistent, be Mindful Consistent!

I saw his status update on Instagram, and an incident flashed, taking me fifteen years back.

Betrayal

Nakul, a simple middle-class boy and a close friend of mine, was in a relationship for four years back then.

He was proud of his relationship.

She was the most precious person in his life at that moment.

I never saw them as fit for each other. I knew something was coming soon.

And one day, he called me crying badly. He sounded distorted. I immediately went to him near his college.

I felt bad seeing him, sitting in a park - the exact place where they dated mostly.

He was down and out.

“What happened?” I asked while putting my hand around his shoulder.

He showed me his phone screen, with an SMS from Mitali (his then-girlfriend).

“I don’t want to talk to you anymore. It’s over.”? (You have been blocked.)

“Any fights, recently?” I asked.

“No! She just stopped messaging, and this message came after I called her multiple times,” he cried.

After a pause,

“I was so consistent in loving her, taking care of her. What had she done to me? How will I live my life?”

Fast forward to today - he is a happily married man with a cute kid.

He doesn’t know anyone with the name ‘Mitali’.

But thinking about this incident made me realise - the problem was consistency.

He was too consistent with her for four years.

They were almost always together on the phone or face-to-face. He was hardly found free to do anything else.

This must have been the problem.

Although, only Mitali can clear it.

Fasting

With this thought came another.

I was listening to a podcast which was about fasting for the human body.

It has multiple benefits:

• Improved gut health
• Better digestion
• Increased immunity
• Positive impact on brain health
• Cellular repair
• Enhanced metabolism

Food is essential for the human body. However, being too consistent with eating leads to a negative impact on the body.

I came to a conclusion -

“Consistency is good up to a certain extent. Too much consistency will reverse the positive impact.”

The right way is -

Mindful consistency.

Let me explain the three aspects of it.

1. Pause and Reflect

I want to become a renowned writer. I want people to know me for my writing.

And to become one, the only advice I got from the internet was - consistency.

I don’t agree.

It was hard for me to be consistent with my schedule even for two months.

I don’t agree with the thought - To achieve anything, you need to suffer or do boring stuff.

No.

It is overrated. You don’t need to suffer pain to achieve the goal.

The reason - If you like something and really want it, why is it suffering then? There is a big flaw.

I love writing, but after those two months, I hated it most. I didn’t want to sit in front of my Mac to write.

My process was -

• Pick the topic from the content calendar.
• Think about personal events in life-related to the topic.
• Write.
• Publish within 48 hours of starting the article (Hard deadline to be consistent).

My writing zeal deteriorated, and hence my article’s quality.

It had no emotion and had a robotic feeling to it.

In the second week of Feb’2024, I understood that I was going in the wrong direction, where I would quit writing like I quit doing YouTube.

I paused.

I reflected.

The next article I wrote and published on 19th Feb’2024, is still my most-read article, with some 1.5K views and an RR of ~70%.

Not just the numbers, but I felt satisfied and happy while writing that article.

I knew somewhere inside that this was straight from the heart.

I regained my enthusiasm for writing again.

I decided to never quit writing and not to make it too much schedule consistent. Enjoy!

Seeing the impact, I started reflecting every week on my -

1. Work
2. Health
3. Relationship

It feels that I am in control and exactly know which part of life to focus on.

2. Reinvent

Reinventing yourself is not an overnight thing.

It’s a compound effect of delta changes we do daily.

Let me try to explain with my own life.

Taking an example of my wanting to be a renowned writer, pause and reflect clearly on my ‘Whats’ & ‘Whys’.

‘Hows’ is where 99% fail. Why?

Because we are not agile.

We try to stick to a plan and follow it.

And being consistent is not the solution.

And when we don’t achieve the goal - we curse our luck or God.

We give up.

But the reason for failure is not luck or any god; it is because we aren’t making the required changes.

We don’t understand the impact of delta changes over time. We lack understanding or rather underestimate the power of the compound effect.

My writing template changed the first time in Feb’2024, and to date, there have been multiple iterations.

I still feel the scope for improvement in it and working on that.

Let me walk you through my template.

1. Initial thought - A rough random thought about the topic. I search my second brain for anything that resonates with the topic.
2. Answer 3 questions - What problem or challenge does my article address; Main goal or outcome of the article; Who will read - The target audience.
3. Outline - Structure and sequence.
4. Title - Stand out of all articles on the page.
5. Sub-title - Underlining message.
6. Images - Should I click or use Unsplash?
7. Hook - What is my first line?
8. Drafts - Minimum two drafts before the final one.
9. Proofread and Publish - Run through Grammarly.

Now, If I go back to the pre-Feb months, my process was blurry. I had fuzzy thoughts.

I am currently working on how to make better hooks, titles, sub-titles & images.

My template will be a work in progress for the coming months.

Keep upgrading.

Don’t settle.

Don’t be consistent.

3. Take a Break

“Don’t break, rather take a break.”

To keep things fresh, interesting, and joyful, we need to take breaks from those things.

Let me explain three aspects of life.

Work

Enjoying long weekends or going on vacation is not a real break. A break from work can happen even at home.

I have seen myself taking a laptop on my vacations. Always check my emails and phone to see work updates.

The reason was - FOMO.

This is not a break.

A break is doing all those things that you don’t do on a normal workday.

Not only that.

Not doing things that you do on a normal day. Like checking mail, checking the phone, waking up at a certain time, following daily rituals, and more such things.

Be like this for a while until you start actually missing your daily routine.

Some will take one day, some will take a week, and a few may take even a month or more.

And this break is a must. We need it.

This should be done at least every six months.

Health

Being mindful of your diet is good. But doing it too consistently will make you -

• Dull
• Boring

People will avoid you.

Ever experienced?

I also believe that eating junk or random food for entertainment is not at all good. True. Doing it in high frequency is not good, but doing it once a month or maybe twice a month is healthy for us.

I did mindful eating for straight 2 months. Let me tell you, I lost a good five kgs, but mentally I was so fatigued and irritated.

David Goggins is an exception; don’t try to generalise, saying to your mind - “If he can do it, why can’t I?”

Although, I am recalibrating my health goals and schedule but making sure to have good cheat days to keep me going.

Relationship

Nakul, my friend who suffered a betrayal, wasn’t actually a betrayal. It was more of - “Too much of each other.”

They both were consistent. Both were too much into each other.

In those four years, he hardly went on a trip with me and other friends.

He missed cricket matches. He missed boys' parties.

Now I think, it was bound to happen, and he learned it the hard way.

He called me last year for a trip to Leh and Ladakh, which I couldn’t go to at that time.

He has changed.

I can see his updates on social media of boys-only trips.

Any relationship can only be worked if there is the right amount of breaks in between.

Going on a solo trip when you have a family is the right thing to do.

Going out with your friends for coffee dates is a nice small break from regular life.

Meeting new people, and engaging with them in activities is happiness.

Breaks are important for refreshing, resetting, and recalibrating.

Don’t fall into the trap of being consistent.

Take a break.

Conclusion

• Mindful consistency is the art of being inconsistently consistent.
• Being consistent is not a goal. The goal is a goal.
• Pause, stop, analyse, & reinvent.