Perseverance is key to Success, But How to Develop It?

“I do not think that there is any other quality so essential to success of any kind as the quality of perseverance. It overcomes almost anything, even nature.”- John D. Rockefeller.

Like many other English words, perseverance derives from  the Latin words Per meaning Through and Severus meaning Severe -that is, through the severe and difficult.

Perseverance is about pursuing high goals and developing an ability to deal with setbacks and failure on the way. It is  persisting  and overcoming a set of obstacles including physical barriers, criticism, and discouragement.

While the path to success is heavily strewn with obstacles, your ability to persevere improves your odds of winning.

Here are ten ways to becoming grittier:

1-Set Goals That You Care to Achieve. Your goals should  be:

-SMART (Specific, Measurable, Attainable, Realistic, and Timely).

-Important, interesting, and valuable.

-In alignment  with your values.

-Carry reasonable risks.

2-Plan. Your plan is the roadmap to your desired destination. The adage: “Plan your work, and work your plan”  holds true. Don’t fly into action without having a detailed plan.

However, planning is neither rigid nor a one-time activity  that takes place only before action. Rather, it is an adaptable, dynamic, flexible, and continuous process that happens all the time until the achievement of your goals. During the execution of your plan, and as you reach one milestone after another, you need to review, revise, and re-evaluate your work, and then re-launch.

Planning also means identifying potential obstacles and problems, and preparing to tackle them as they arise.

3-Choose and Commit Yourself to Persevere. Perseverance is a combination of habit and mental attitude. Wanting to persist is not enough if not coupled with will. Not only does grit require motivation but volition as well. It takes mental toughness to translate your intentions into actions.

“If you can’t fly then run, if you can’t run then walk, if you can’t walk then crawl, but whatever you do you have to keep moving forward.”-Martin Luther King.

 However, perseverance is not blind stubborness or obstinacy.

"The difference between perseverance and obstinacy is that one comes from a strong will, and the other from a strong won't." - Henry Ward Beecher.

5-Increase Your Skills, Knowledge, and Abilities (SKAs). Before starting to execute your plans, make sure that you have what it takes to succeed. Nothing fails like a soldier going to war without the necessary combat skills, ability  to fight, and mastery to battle the enemy. To win, you need to keep on honing your skills, upgrading your knowledge, and improving your abilities.

4-Take action. You can not achieve anything without action. Action is what makes your dreams come true. It is also action that translates plans into tangible results. Thinking and planning alone won’t cut it. Action –that is, sustained action- is what separate winners from losers.

“Vision is not enough, it must be combined with venture. It is not enough to stare up the steps, we must step up the stairs.” -Vaclav Havel

“A river cuts through rock not because of its power, but because of its persistence.”-Jim Watkins.

4-Motivate Yourself. The concept of pain and pleasure comes to mind. While thinking of the bad consequences of failing, consider the rewards of achieving success. And as you associate perseverance with success and feeling good, view struggle and patience as a doorway to victory. Don’t forget to celebrate your small wins and mini-achievements along the way.     

“Victory belongs to the most persevering.”-Napoleon.

Forgive yourself for failing, learn from your mistakes, adjust course accordingly, but never give up.

“Perseverance is failing 19 times and succeeding the 20th.”-Julie Andrews.

Read the biographies of and get inspired by successful people who achieved great  successes in spite of the huge obstacles, setbacks, and failures they encountered. Helen Keller, Ludwig Vas Beethoven, Thomas Edison, Terry Fox, and many others provide motivating examples.   

5-Stay Optimistic.  Having positive hopes, beliefs, and expectations fuels your motivation to persevere. You can’t persist if you have a gloomy outlook on the future and feel depressed. Switching your mind to optimism and hopefulness takes self-awareness and self-management. Don’t let your mind run wild with imagined failures; excite it with anticipated victories.   

6-Break Macro-Goals into Micro-goals.  You can eat an elephant one bite at a time, and a journey of one thousand miles begins with one step. No matter how daunting the task is, just take the first step, and keep on putting one foot in front of the other. The journey is no less important than the destination.

“Success is the sum of small efforts, repeated day in and day out.”-Robert Collier.

8-Get out of Your Comfort Zone.  Lazy and weak-willed people like to stay in their comfort zone and are quick to throw in the towel at the first sign of challenges and temporary setbacks. They are quitters, and don’t like to pay the price:   

“Success is the child of drudgery and perseverance. It can not be coaxed or bribed; pay the price and it is yours.”-Orison Swett.

To succeed, you need to put in the necessary efforts and resources.

 9-Surround Yourself with and Seek out the Right People. You need people who would support and encourage you to achieve your dreams, desires, and goals. You also need to reach out to experts for their advice and insights on how to carry on with the fulfillment of your dreams.

10-Take Care of  Yourself: mind, body, and spirit.

 Mind.  We all may fall prey to feelings of frustration and stress. Nothing dampens enthusiasm like feeling defeated. Learn to become resilient, and get to know how to de-stress and relax. Manage your thoughts, be disciplined, boost your self-confidence, and shake off self-doubts and worries.

Body. Having a healthy body improves your tenacity to persist. Eat well, exercise, and follow up on your health. 

Spirit. Having beliefs goes a long way towards boosting your drive to endure during hard times. Spirituality enhances your grit to succeed.

According to psychologists, taking care of your mind, body, and spirituality raises the level of dopamine in your brain. This chemical- dopamine- is responsible for improving your tenacity  to make it through the tough spots.

 Besides, you can always call on coaches, mentors, medics, monks, priests, and others to assist you  in taking better care of yourself.

The importance of perseverance can not be stressed enough. It is the most powerful avenue to success. It is a combination of want and will. If you manage to improve it, you can improve your odds of winning.

What is your take on perseverance?

Please share your thoughts in the comments section below.

Thank you for reading my post. Here are some other recent posts I have written:

• Want to be Successful? Be Curious.
• How to Boost Your Courage in Business
• 10 Golden Rules for Successful Delegation
• How to Overcome Business Indecision
• 9 Ways to Triumph over Your Business Fears
• Why Smile at Work
• Are You a Workaholic?
• Don’t Procrastinate

 Hanna Saba is a freelance management advisor.