Overcoming the self-defeating mindset: “Don’t start because you won’t be consistent”

 

Do you have these kind of thoughts plaguing your mind, from time to time? 

In a recent course, a sister asked a question, “Someone told me that I shouldn’t start wearing hijab, because if I do, then I won’t be consistent. Then I would take it off. And then put it back on. It’s as if I’m not taking religion seriously. If you want to do it, do it consistently. Or else, don’t even bother”

Sometimes, we tell this to ourselves, too - “I’d rather not start (insert good habit), because if I’m worried that I won’t be consistent.”

This can be anything, from starting to work out, starting to memorize Qur’an, reading a book, enrolling for a course, publishing content on social media, eating healthy, etc. 

Where does it come from? 

Firstly, perfectionism. “If you aren’t going to be consistent, don’t bother.” 

In that unhealthy striving for perfectionism, we become paralyzed from even taking the first step. In many cases, the root cause of this perfectionism comes down to our own ego: Our need to feel embody the persona that “I am a consistent person”, and to protect ourselves from shame of being a "quitter", “I don’t want to be the kind of ‘hangat-hangat taik ayam’ person who starts something and just gives up”.

It’s an indirect form of “fear of failure” in that we hate to confront the potential reality that we might fail to live up to our own expectations. All of it ultimately leads to the same thing: In our fear of being "inconsistent", we self-sabotage. We use "fear of inconsistency" as an excuse to never even start.

It's one of the traps that Shaitan whispers into our subconscious minds to fool us from taking action.

So, how can we overcome it? 

Firstly, stop giving - and listening to - bad advice. Especially those which discourage you from taking action. 

Secondly, shift our mindset to one that focuses on encouraging progress, not perfection: imperfect is better than zero. In fact, ANYTHING is better than zero.

As author Ismail Kamdar once said, “writing 2 pages of crap is better than not writing anything at all”. 

It’s okay to slip and make mistakes. Just keep moving on. Think of ourselves as babies learning to walk. We will fail, sometimes even fall flat on our face. yes, it hurts. But we stand up, we try again. We learn from past attempts. We improve. We try to be more consistent. 

Sure, we may start something and fall off the rails. Maybe we start our workout routine, or memorizing half a page, or pray tahajjud, start an online course, only to find ourselves quitting after the third session. 

My response to that is, well, at least you’ve done two sessions. Since when has zero sessions been better than two? 

Fine, you’ve stopped reading after page 15. Isn’t 15 pages better than no pages at all?

Get rid of this idea that we must be perfect. (It’s perfectly okay to NOT finish reading a book!)

“The journey of a thousand miles begins with one step”.