Going extra mile award consistent people

Somebody has said something like that: "Go the extra mile. It's never crowded." What do you think: Why it is never crowded? Because it is hard, isn't it? It requires perseverance. It requires consistency. But doing it and going extra mile award consistent people.

What do you think: Why this beach at the photo below is empty? I tell you, why.

It is cold. No, not in Indonesia but in Estonia. We (me and my family) just moved back to our home country for the next half year. Estonia is in the North and even though it is summer then compared to Indonesia it is quite cold for me here. We live close to a nice small lake and I decided that even though it is cold I still want to go to swim every day. Well, the first days after our arrival were warm and sunny. The little beach was crowded, kids were playing in the water, teens were jumping in and out and adults were sunbathing.

But as it is in the North then these nice days just don't last. Few days later the weather got cooler and each morning when I went to swim the beach was empty. Just two-three people walking and 1 swimming, something like that. The water was 22 degrees Celsius (71.6 F) and it was not really comfortable to get in. It took some willpower to get into the water. But once in, it was nice. I have read that cold causes our blood circulate better and we are more alert too.

So the next days I did my swimming quite alone. Weather was not nice and other people did not bother to show up. Yet I kept my decision to be consistent and do my swimming every day, whatever the day and weather.

Well, it is easy to decide, harder still to keep it. This morning I woke up and it was cold, way cooler than the previous days. I knew I should go swimming but I definitely did not want to do that any more. Then I thought that I just skip this one cold day, probably tomorrow will be warmer again and then I will go.

A little bit later I opened my mail box and found Kali's (kaliinozark's) answering me here in WA. And he wrote: "I read that only 5% of the people who do this will ever make enough money to support themselves without other income. I want to be one of the 5%. Just like my students, those that don't do the work don't get the grades..."

And reading his post something interesting happened - suddenly I found my motivation again. Suddenly I did not care any more if the weather was cold or whatever... I took my towel, went right to the beach and did my swimming. Needless to say, I was alone there.

There are also few lessons that I learn here:

Lesson 1.
As the statistics says, something like 95% of those who want to do online marketing, fail and only 5% succeed. Actually, if I observe life then it is quite the same almost everywhere. Even swimming and other sports. There are many who like to do sports. Yet the masses... the masses like to enjoy comfortable life. They don't like hardships. If the weather is warm and sunny then they come out and enjoy it. As soon as it gets a little bit cooler and harder they stop. Cooler/harder again and even more of those who stop.

Somebody has said: "Go the extra mile, it's never crowded". I just got experience that even to swim in a cool lake - it was easy to get into this 5%... or 1%... or 0.01%. It only requires a little bit willpower and consistency.

Lesson 2.
We are people, we are weak and we have always temptation to give up. We tend do our decisions and give our promises in good conditions - when we have just started something new and our excitement level is high. But when these conditions get worse and harder then we tend to loose our excitement and the temptation comes to give up. We do not give up everything right away. But we surely make the first step toward it - we are so smart to fool ourselves - we say: "I just skip it one time. Not 2 times, not 3 times, just 1 time. Just today. Tomorrow I definitely do it again."

Problem is, once we have skipped it, the probability is way higher that we will skip the next time too. We all know what happens after that.

Lesson 3.
When the the temptation to give up hits us then we need friends and people around us who support and encourage us. As I found my motivation from kaliinozark's posting here in WA this morning. I don't know if he ever thought that his few lines here motivate somebody on the other side of the world to jump into a cold lake? But they did it. We need friends and I have found that this WA is a good environment to encourage and support each other to push on and make the next step.

Lesson 4.
To succeed we need consistency. As with swimming and other sports - it is not enough that we are active only on warm, sunny days when everything is perfect for us. We need to learn perseverance and consistency. I have actually learned to love and embrace hard, uncomfortable situations because I know that these very conditions make me stronger, build my patience, perseverance and make me survivor. It needs something from me to do it (whatever it is) every day, whatever the conditions.

Like cold water - it is not easy to get in - I need some willpower to force myself to make that step. Yet once done I become stronger - physically, mentally and my confidence grows too - I can do it.

The same with online marketing and everything in our life. If we are not afraid of pain and suffering, if we are not afraid of hard work then we definitely make it into this 5%... or 1% who succeed because as it is - the masses like to enjoy comfortable life and they do not want to go this extra mile.

As it was: "Go the extra mile - it's never crowded."

Egon