To Persist or to Persevere, that is the Question…

The action of being persistent can often mean you are doing the same thing over and over. Sometimes that can be good but sometimes, not so much. Take for example the analogy I love to give my clients: If you keep putting the same ingredients in your cake, you will keep getting the same cake. If you want a different cake, you have to put in different ingredients. When being persistent with something, it's important to know when enough is enough and you need to try something new to reach your goal. Especially when that cake you're making is really not the cake you want to be eating at all! 😉

The illusion that the ability to persist is always a virtue has caused people to stay in toxic relationships with people they don’t respect, put up with jobs they hate, and generally just continue to perform the same painful action over and over again, in hopes that it will be better someday. Not surprisingly, it almost never gets better. That’s when people turn hopeless and bitter.

Perseverance on the other hand, is always good. It’s more about tackling each problem as it comes up and moving on towards your goal no matter what. There’s no real time limit to perseverance because the challenges when you persevere aren’t usually consistent or repetitive. There’s always a different obstacle or problem that you need to overcome to get to your final destination.

When you persevere, you’re not stubborn or illogically resolute; you’re strong, determined and steadily moving forward, even if it’s just a small step at a time. You look adversity in the face and push through with determination to reach your goal.

Let's take the example of being stuck in a job that you hate with persistence - You feel stuck… you don't really know how to get out of it, so you just keep pushing on. You might be persistent in going to work, day in and day out. But you’re doing the same thing over and over and you aren’t going to get a different result unless something changes. You’ll still be stuck in a miserable job you hate a month, a year, five years or more from now.

If you want a different result, you can’t always just be persistent and keep at something. Sometimes you’ve got to have courage and change things up.

Now, let’s go back to that job you hate and look at it with perseverance. Same situation but this time, you're willing to persevere and do what it takes to climb over each obstacle, solve the problems that keep you feeling stuck and make changes. You challenge yourself to step out of your comfort zone, to learn something new, to figure things out. You're willing to persevere through whatever difficulty might come up, in order to reach the goal you want of landing your dream job.

Perseverance is such a strong character trait to have because regardless of what you’re faced with, you know this character trait will help you get through anything that is in front of you so you can reach those goals you really want to reach.

This doesn’t mean persistence is completely a bad thing. Being persistent and sticking to something is great when you see that it's moving you forward toward a goal. So of course, it’s good to be persistent at times but be cautious and aware of when you are using persistence as a defense mechanism. Doing the same thing over and over again without an improved result means persisting at it isn’t serving you so well. And instead, it’s time to shift to perseverance so you can really tackle that obstacle in front of you in order to reach the goal you want to achieve.

Knowing which character traits you want to practice and possess will help you know which character traits will serve you best, especially when dealing with adversity. So think about the list of character traits you’ve been building over the past couple weeks. (If you haven’t read the last few Masterful Mindsets, go back and read those so you’ll know what I’m talking about.) Then really define out those character traits that you want to possess. Make sure they are serving you to be your best self. And if they aren’t, then make the tweaks or adjustments - like maybe to persevere rather than to persist - so you can be your best true you in good times and in bad. 

***Building a list of character traits or virtues you want to live by can be a powerful exercise. If you'd like to start learning more about how to live a HEROIC life, click HERE for free access to one of the best personal growth and development apps out there.