LEARNING FROM ABRAHAM LINCOLN, THE VALUE OF CONSISTENCY.

“The fight must go on. The cause of civil liberty must not be surrendered at the end of one, or even one hundred defeats”.

– Abraham Lincoln(After losing the senatorial elections twice).

Abraham Lincoln, otherwise known as Abe, Honest abe or old abe by most people of his time, was one of the most profound statesman that the United States of America ever had.

I remember when I first looked through his biography, authored by David Herbert Donald. I was looking for a book when I stumbled upon it. Let’s say, I was below the age of twelve. At that time, the main thing then was having a phone of your own and being on Facebook. But for me, I just wanted to read.

I had always heard the name Abraham Lincoln.Back then, I just knew that he was once a president of the united States, who defined the simplest meaning of democracy. Taking out that biography that day and looking through it, changed my perspective about him. I no longer saw him as just being once a president, I saw him as a born leader. I saw him as someone of perseverance and consistency. Someone, who wasn’t pulled down by his background, his failures, physical appearance or what people said or thought about him.

To be honest, he should be seen as a source of inspiration to all. He was a man who had a thrist for distinction. Despite the fact that he came from a family of not so educated people, Abraham Lincoln choose to make a difference. He always thought about the nation’s problems and how he could help solve them. His persistence and ambitions lead to him becoming the 16th president of the United States of America and one of the greatest president to rule the nation.

“With malice towards none; with charity for all; with firmness in the right, as God gives us to see the right, let us strive on to finish the work we are in…………..”

-Abraham Lincoln

Believe me when I say, that I’m not trying to paint him as a perfectionist, because nobody is. But his consistency is what endeared me to him. He didn’t have a stable education, yet he read on his own to become a lawyer. He didn’t want to end up like his father, who, to him, lacked ambition.

He was less prepared to be the president of the united States than any other man who had ran for the office. At the age of fifty, he had no proper formal education and had no administrative experience. He hadn’t even been a governor or a mayor. He had lost the senatorial elections twice in 1855 & 1859 respectively. To be honest, with all this, it looked like he didn’t stand a chance. He even said so himself.

His doubts and fears didn’t stop him from believing that he could still help his nation. With the help and support of his colleagues, he succeeded in doing so. He was consistent in what he did best; Trying again and again and again.

Someone once said;“We become what we want to be by consistently being what we want to become each day”.

Consistency is the key that unlocks a door called success. You can’t open the door without it. Trust me when I say, it takes time to open the door. If you get the key and hold on to it, for a long time, the door will be easier to open. If you lose it on the way, you’ll have a hard time opening the door because the key is the only way out. In a simpler sentence: CONSISTENCY IS THE KEY TO SUCCESS.

“Success doesn’t come from what you do occasionally. It comes from what you do consistently”

–Marie Forleo.

If you have ambitions and passions for something, I’ll advise you to keep at it every step of the way. Don’t slow down your pace, increase it. Distractions make it hard to be consistent, but you’ve got to;

1– BE OPTIMISTIC

You don’t expect to be consistent in achieving your dreams when you have a negative mindset about things. Be positive in whatever you want to pursue. It may seem to be fruitless or time wasting for now. But trust me when I say, it’ll all pay off one day. Understand that consistency is essential and nothing can be achieved without it. Therefore, stay positive and try finding the good sides in things and people rather than the bad sides.

2–BE PATIENT.

Don’t expect success to open so quickly for you. It takes discipline, hard work, time and dedication. Above all, patience. Everyone has their own time to shine. You’ve just got to be patient and wait for yours. In doing so, let hard work and dedication become the forces that drag you.

“There is neither a shortcut nor any secret to becoming rich. But there is a process to becoming rich. A process that demands discipline, commitment, consistency, perseverance and character of the highest order”.

–Manoj Arora.

HARD WORK + DEDICATION+ CONSISTENCY= SUCCESS.

I guess, I’ll be stopping here today. The key word here is consistency. You may be wondering why I decided to use Abraham Lincoln as the key example. I guess, I got Inspired to do so. That doesn’t mean that there aren’t others. Thomas Edison was consistent and he became one of the greatest inventor of his time. Despite being called backward by his schoolmaster, his mother taught him on her own. She proved to all that her son was Indeed Intelligent and he turned out to be. Other examples incudes; Ben Carson, Muhammed Ali and many more.

Here are some quotes I picked off the internet on consistency;

“It’s not what we do once in a while that shapes our lives. It’s what we do consistently”.

—Anthony Robbins.

“It’s not perfection we seek, for perfection is impossible. It is instead consistency”.

—Brandon Sanderson

“Success isn’t always about greatness. It’s about consistency. Consistent hard work leads to success. Greatness will come”.

—Dwayne Johnson.

Feel free to share your thoughts and views. Till next time.