Keep wearing them down
I had a guy friend who swears on his life that he would never date this particular girl. He would go on and on about all of her negative traits and that she was wasting her time trying to pursue him.
She never stopped and I saw that it was a matter of time until my friend would crack. He wouldn’t stop talking about her and despite his complaints, I knew she had him.
She taught me a valuable lesson in just wearing something down consistently and over time, you’ll get what you want.
A drop of water into a valley
As a kid, we went to a natural science exhibit and that’s where I saw this principle in physical representation. This exhibit explained that over time, drops of water could eventually make a dent into stone.
There were three demonstrations of the flow of water, with each increasing in flow. With the first one, was small drops, and the last was a constant stream of water. On top of it said how many divots there’d be after 10 years.
The first demonstration showed perhaps an inch or two inches, the second was about 3–4 inches, but the last one was a noticeable 8–10 inches. You could really see the stone being divided by the water.
That’s how repeated actions, under consistency, could eventually allow you to have a breakthrough.
It feels like when we do something hard, we’re making no progress at all. But it could be you’re making less than a percent of improvement, thus making it difficult to scale it. But cumulatively, it will add up.
That’s the paradox of improvement — you’re getting better but you don’t know that because of the environment you’re in. If you’re a boxer, it’s challenging to scale if you’re getting better because your teammates are getting better with you. Perhaps it’s easier if one of them gets injured and you’re training all the time.
You only get to see progress when you go to another gym and you’re consistently dominating.
Sometimes, regardless of what you do, it seems like there is no progress. You’ve hit a roadblock. Progress isn’t as linear as we want. Simply showing up isn’t enough. It’s mandatory but it doesn’t guarantee success.
However, this presents an opportunity to think about how we’re approaching things. It might work just to keep doing the same thing until you attain mastery. Perhaps it’s better to take an alternative approach to the solution. Going around the wall or going through it are both answers.
The key ingredient is not stopping. You can physically rest the body but do not let the mind stop.
There will be days where you don’t do much and that’s fine. I’d argued that would be the more important times when you should continue even if you don’t want to.
You’ll learn that a dull axe will eventually cut down the tree, or you’ll learn to get better tools or sharpen it better.
The breaking point
People are complex and don’t work like your hobbies. In fact, too much involvement and poor timing can lead to never having a chance for a relationship.
You can wear people out in different ways; one where they get sick of your crap and just let you do whatever, or one where they can no longer deny your tenacity and effort.
It’s a thin line between one that’s negatively and positively impactful.
If you’re continuously bothering someone for something that only benefits you, you might get it but believe me, it’s not going to be the best effort put forward by the other party or it’ll be a one-time deal.
I see this a lot when people don’t look for a mutually beneficial relationship. The easiest example is for tourists visiting the city — people will haggle you or even scam you. Sure they’ll just succeed one time, but that’s all they need. When you’re a replaceable tourist, they don’t need to treat you well so you’ll return.
However, for some people, if you wear them out long enough, they’ll convince themselves there is some type of positive trait with perseverance.
Again, there are two spectrums to perseverance — one with mutual benefits and one where it’s one-sided.
It’s admirable to see someone chase after you and not give up, but ask yourself what are their intentions. Perhaps it’s our fault but once we get what we strive so hard to achieve, we don’t often appreciate what we have.
Ever since I entered the workforce, I worked hard to become a manager. I stayed late at night, had numerous conversations with my superiors to see how I could get there, and made my intentions known. Once I got the position, I became lax and took it for granted. The chase was more important and instead of working hard to keep it going, I got comfortable.
At the time, my superior was disappointed in my actions upon the promotion and it took me years to understand why. From his eyes, I used him to get what I wanted. I wore him out with my perseverance and he picked wrong. The company suffered because of my incompetence.
While I can’t deny my hard work gave me a chance, I focused that hard work on the wrong thing. My goal was just to become a manager, and it was never about helping others.
The tree and the forest
Once you get in the perseverance loop, you tend to focus on the tree (the goal) and lose sight of the forest (overall purpose). I believe once we taste failure, it drives us to our goal but it comes at a sacrifice of losing our purpose.
Sure, the title of manager is great but the purpose of the position is to help others on your team find success. Team success comes first, and by doing so, you will get individual success as well.
When you don’t get something, it now becomes more desirable. It distracts from the overall picture.
Let’s go back to my friend, he eventually dated the girl. But he quickly found out that she kept persevering because of her pride. Everyone around her told her to give up, but that just fueled her fire even more. My friend convinced himself that if this girl would keep going despite rejection after rejection, that’s a great quality in a partner.
They were both committed for the wrong reasons. They never really talked and got to know each other. She kept going until he folded. Once she got what she wanted, the fire calmed, and things weren’t as great as before.
They quickly found out that they didn’t really have much in common, and the relationship ended.
The chase is great but it’s the process and the purpose that will get you further than you expected.
Keep in mind this method might work for everything else besides humans. I’m a strong believer in consistently doing something every day until you get better at it, and you will. It might not be soon, but it’s eventual.
People are complex and you can’t just keep wearing them out and get the desired effects.
You may get what you want, but is it what you need? And will it endure the test of time and pressure?
*Check out my last article on Acceptance will drive you crazy*
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