No Commitment, No Start; No Consistency, No Finish
Lessons to live by from a Hollywood legend
At the 48th NAACP Image Awards in 2017, Denzel Washington received the award for Outstanding Actor in a Motion Picture for his role in "Fences."
During his inspiring acceptance speech, he underlined the importance of perseverance to achieve one’s goal.
He said:
“Without commitment - you will never start”
But more importantly
“Without consistency - you will never finish”
We all know too well how hard it is to start something - anything, let alone take it to the finish line!
But that is exactly the road one must take to reach success in life and realise the dream we want to achieve.
This resonates with something that I previously wrote about “creating your own destiny” - to be brave enough to leave our old life behind and start something new.
Consistency you say?
What does it mean to be consistent here?
I can draw some examples from my own experience. Being consistent could be like:
Regularly attending classes even when you don't feel like it to finish a course successfully
Practising a musical instrument daily to improve your skills.
Sticking with the diet plan to lose weight.
Writing regularly to become a prolific writer.
Washington specifically mentioned Barry Jenkins, who made over 20 short films before his triple Oscar-winning ‘Moonlight’.
In short, if you are focused, dedicated and persevering enough, you will get there.
But It’s Hard!
YES, Washington admitted, it is NOT EASY!
He said:
“If it were easy, there would be no Denzel Washington”
I give you another example:
My 2 children have been attending piano lessons since they were 7. As you might’ve imagined, there were good days and bad days. I lost count of how many times they wanted just to give up and quit.
But I kept telling them to persevere. “Just keep practising and you will get it in the end.”
Of course, I made sure that I was always there beside them through thick and thin, ready to support them.
I knew their ability and I knew that they could, and they did.
Never Give Up!
Washington followed this up with the classic push:
“Keep working, keep striving, never give up; fall down 7 times - get up 8”
I tell you something.
I ‘fell down’ - just last year. If you check my newsletter, I stopped writing at the end of April, and didn’t write anything until 8 months later!
Talking about perseverance - I was lacking!
Talking about consistency - I flunked!
This post is my attempt to renew my commitment and restart my consistency.
Hardship Fuels Growth
And as a closing statement, I think this could become his legendary quote, he said:
Washington closed the speech by saying the following could-be-a-legendary quote:
“Ease is a greater threat than hardship”
Wow, I had to listen to this thought-provoking statement a couple of times to grasp the gravity of what he said.
This says to me that without challenges there is no progress.
If we are comfortable with the status quo, then nothing will change in our lives.
And therefore I must embrace hardship because it’s the catalyst of progress.
I hope you are as inspired as I was. I am embedding the video of the speech here for your perusal.
Let me know in the comment what resonates with you the most.
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Hi there!
If you are new, it’s good to see you and thanks for reading so far.
My name is Chris Prakoso, I came originally from Indonesia but am now settling down in Slovakia with my family. I used to write a blog professionally but I stopped.
That is until I decided to write again and joined Substack.
In the past, I mainly wrote about technology, but here with Life Apprentice I am trying to share some of my life-learned lessons from the past, or today, or something I feel is important for the future.
You can find topics ranging from geeky stuff to parenting, from living a healthy life to travelling, and from personal development to entrepreneurship.
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