Don’t get derailed in 2021

Years ago, I was researching what it took to succeed with digital marketing, and I accidentally uncovered what it took to succeed in business and life. I discovered two truths I believe to this day:

1. Consistency is boring and difficult, at least for me.
2. Consistency is key to success.

I’ve seen this work in sales, in marketing, in parenting, in my relationship with my wife, in my Christianity, in health, the list goes on. It works everywhere!

Sure, we were all hoping the world might magically go back to how it was when the clock struck midnight on December 31. But just like every new year, nothing changed overnight.

Of course, now we know that sometimes the world does change overnight. During spring break of 2020, my wife, kids, and I were visiting family down in Dallas. By the end of the week, the world had changed entirely. When we got back to Edmond, we were essentially quarantined.

I’m a social guy. It took just two weeks for me to start to go crazy, abandon the routine behaviors I knew I needed to succeed, realize what was going on, then start scheduling regular Zoom calls with business friends to maintain connections.

I let the circumstances I was in derail the behaviors I knew I needed to do consistently. Did I need to make adjustments? Of course. But I already knew what I needed to do to succeed. I just had to figure out how to do some of it differently.

Let’s forget about the entire world for a minute. How can you personally succeed in 2021? What behaviors do you need to do regularly? Adjust to outside circumstances, but don’t let them derail you.