I posted this ad to my Facebook page on Tuesday morning. In the ad, there was a picture of a woman walking on a bridge through bare trees and mist.
The message I typed on this pic was:
If you stick with something for a year, you’ll become unrecognizable.
In the text box above the picture, I elaborated:
Your weekly yoga class?? What if you stuck with it for a year? Who would you be? Notice I didn’t say, “What would you LOOK like? But, “Who would you BE? Hmmmm…
Lots of people showed up for that class on Tuesday. I was shocked by the turnout, frankly.
Did this ad hit a nerve? Or was this full class simply the result of the predictable January, New Year/ New You thing?
I teased my class about it. I said, “I love seeing you all!” But I’m going to miss you so much in March!
But I really do hope this is the year some of them decide to fight for their weekly yoga class, and make a commitment, and persist.
Consistent follow-through, week after week, transforms you. You might not become unrecognizable, but you will become changed.
Unrecognizable
Everybody hopes their physical workout will transform them—make them into a totally different person: a yoga person, a runner, a weightlifter, a whatever.
They hope others will notice the transformation and go, “Whoa! What have you been doing? You look fantastic!
While they focus on changes in body weight or muscle tone, they often overlook what is happening on the inside due to sheer persistence. The act of showing up to train, day after day, month after month, year after year is the alchemical ingredient.
Yoga sutra 1.14 says, That yoga is truly grounded when it is done persistently, with reverence, for a long time.”
Recognizable
Three years ago, I committed to posting here every Thursday (except Thanksgiving). I told myself, “It doesn’t have to be good, Kath; it just has to be done.”
If I could do that, I thought, then I could call myself a writer, or at least, a blogger. Persistence would confer legitimacy to my claim of being a writer, whereas writing only when I felt like it would not. Steven Pressfield calls this “Turning Pro.”
I am not unrecognizable as a result of this 3-year blogging stint, but I am definitely changed. No one can tell from looking at my body that I’ve written weekly posts for the last three years without a miss. But I can feel a difference in my overall level of confidence as a person and my level of self-respect.
I don’t look any different, but I feel so solid, and grounded, —like there’s an oak tree growing inside me, its roots in my pelvis, its branches in my brain. I can be trusted to do what I say I’ll do and be who I say I am.
And the vehicle that allows me to see and feel all this is this little blog that I reluctantly approach each week with the same question: What the hell am I going to write today?
Consistency with this blog makes me feel trustworthy and reliable. I feel proud of myself and confident knowing that if I set out to do something, I won’t let myself down.
Inspiration Location 