Consistency Beats Intensity

In Pretty Much Every Aspect of Life

“Success is the product of a daily habits - not once in a lifetime transformation.” - James Clear

Consistency vs. Intensity

Here’s the thing; practice makes perfect better. You probably remember your teachers and parents preaching how practice makes perfect, but I disagree. Rather than striving for perfection, we should strive for consistency in order to improve incrementally on whichever endeavors we pursue.

For example, consistently choosing fruit over candy bars and whole foods over ultra-processed foods seven days a week for six months will significantly yield improved body composition if you’re trying to lose some weight. Conversely, if you only intensified your diet and ate “clean” during the week and indulged on the weekend with hyper-palatable foods, you will easily erase all the good work you did during the week. Thus, consistency beats intensity every time!

We can take this example to art and writing as well. As a working professional in the engineering and construction industry, I struggled with finding time for my creative career, often resorting to intense sessions on weekends. Nevertheless, my husbandly and fatherly duties (in that order - wink), always come first, followed by Me-Time™. And like many other working professionals trying to balance two careers simultaneously, one will always be a priority over the other. This is why “balance” is a misnomer, in work and in life.

But then, I discovered some techniques and tools from other artists that turned my intensity into consistency. Award-winning Picture Book Illustrator and Substack Master, Adam Ming, taught me that you can get better with only a 10-min daily practice. After filling up multiple sketch books, I realized how incredible small, incremental steps were in helping me improve my practice. Before incorporating a daily art practice, I never filled a sketch book! In fact, I had a sketch book my wife bought me 21 years ago with blank pages desperately longing (begging) for my attention. If spiders¹ could spin webs in between blank sketch-book pages, Hollywood would be knocking at my door trying to film the next Arachnophobia Movie!

This article is getting a little long, so here’s one of my awesome artworks to distract me you of spiders for a minute (insert elevator music).

Don’t worry - Blue survived after his tragic encounter with an angry 2-year old. Red is still a bit traumatized, but exposure therapy is helping…

Closing Thoughts

Spiders DON’T belong in this world! Sorry, they can still live here, just not in my house or anywhere near me, okay?

I digress.

Consistency beats Intensity every time. Whether you’re trying to find time to lift weights or build a successful business, you should always try to find time each day, even if it’s only 10 minutes, to work on improving incrementally rather than trying to squeeze everything into an intense weekend session.

Thanks for reading! Until next time, keep writing and drawing, but most importantly - keep dreaming!

1. I’m not scared of anything! That’s right, I’m tough as nails. But spiders 🕷️… I’m running like a little school girl for dear life!