I’m occasionally asked the secret to a successful workout program. My answer is always the same – discipline and consistency. No matter what you choose to do, if you have the discipline to do it consistently, you will succeed. That’s why when I’m on the road for work, I get up and go to the gym. I belong to a national chain where I can workout in most cities in the US. In the cities where my gym doesn’t have a presence, I find other places to workout. I swap my workout schedule around so as not to take too many off days. I’ve created the discipline to be consistent, even when my life is inconsistent.
Blogging is the same. You need to be consistent. Publish on the same frequency, the same day (or days, if you are so inclined) each week. I always have told my clients not to start a blog unless they have 6 weeks of material in the can. And I’ve seen blogs fail for lack of content.
Well, now I have to eat my own dog food. If there is anyone who actually follows this blog on a weekly basis, you probably noticed that I didn’t publish last week. Why? Because I didn’t have the discipline to pound out a post, and I ran out of scheduled inventory. There are a lot of reasons behind that, like a crazy business travel schedule and sheer exhaustion. In the end it comes out to one reason – lack of discipline and consistency on my part.
Coming back around to the workout portion of this, I blew that, too. For the first time in a long time, I just didn’t get to the gym for days at a time. I lacked the discipline to get my ass out of bed and go while I was on the road, and didn’t do so when I got home, either.
Let’s talk about results. Skipping a week on the blog probably didn’t do too much damage. If it did, it’s not like this is a commercial blog. I do it for me, to keep myself in practice writing on a regular basis. According to James Ting, MD of the Hoag Orthopedic Institute, I didn’t skip enough workouts to start falling out of shape. But both of these skips had impact – I feel like shit about myself. I’ve failed to deliver on something I find important. That’s why it’s time to get back to work.
See you next week on this blog. See you tomorrow morning in the gym.