Persistence is Magic

My grandson is almost 11 months old. When he was 9 months old he could tell what he wanted to grab was still there, even when my son's large hand was covering it. It's amazing–our human ability to identify what we want, reach for it, and persist in the face of obstacles, even when we have been here only a matter of months. 

It would seem these capacities are part of our nature. We may be taught that to ask for what we want is rude, to reach for what we want is selfish, to persist in trying to get it is unreasonable, yet we are coded to do these very things.

Some of our religious and cultural values have taught us that we should overcome these inclinations in order to become more spiritual or more selfless. It is essential we understand and act with awareness that our choices affect a larger circle of life than ourselves, but I think there is an essential goodness to the capacities we are endowed with. In fact, I think our spiritual development requires us to put away the intense self-doubt and self-denial that have accompanied our socialization. We need to behold ourselves in wonderment! We need to recognize our essential worthiness and the worthiness of our dreams and goals.

Most of us give up too easily as adults, but that's not how we started out as kids. Now that we have learned to value compassion and empathy it would be worthwhile to apply these to ourselves and rediscover our natural gifts, developing them from an adult's (hopefully) balanced perspective. 

It's time to banish the uglies in our self-talk and thought! Such painful, unfair criticisms. Such unnecessary self-limiting.

The gifts of knowing what we want and taking action to move toward it persistently have always been part of who we are. But they have been overlaid by years of conditioning and unlearning. This subdues our sensitivity to their urgings. We can learn to feel these and trust them again. We can allow ourselves to feel clarity and the motivation that propelled us much earlier in our lives. It is the conditioning that came in from the outside that is not native to our spirits, not the inborn abilities that we were created and born to use.

Talent is an amazing thing, but talent alone does not guarantee success. Education is an empowering privilege, but education does not assure that we will do well in life. Both of these can be undermined by that gatekeeping voice of self-doubt and criticism that keeps our efforts in check so that we give up before real results can begin to flow.

Persistence is magic. There is a familiar quote from Jesus in the Gospel of Matthew that is familiar to many of us: "Ask, and it will be given to you; seek, and you will find; knock, and it will be opened to you." 

But there is an extended story that precedes this quote as it is presented in the book of Luke: "Suppose one of you has a friend, and goes to him at midnight and says to him, 'Friend, lend me three loaves; for a friend of mine has come to me from a journey, and I have nothing to set before him,' and from inside he answers and says, 'Do not bother me; the door has already been shut and my children and I are in bed; I cannot get up and give you anything.' I tell you, even though he will not get up and give him anything because he is his friend, yet because of his persistence he will get up and give him as much as he needs." And then Luke concludes with a similar version of the quote from Matthew after the story. This changes the nature of the advice. It shifts from encouragement to ask for what we want in Matthew, to encouragement to refuse to give up until we get what we are asking for in Luke. It is a message to persist until we get results.

And persistence does produce results like nothing else. Next time you're feeling down on yourself and discouraged, and you're about to give up on something you want, remember this and renew your efforts in a new way. Don't give up. Instead, imagine what you want as already successfully achieved and feel it as done. Imagine that you have accomplished it, deserve it, and are enjoying it. Imagine that this goodness you have brought into your experience blesses many others as well. Then get up and go for it again.

For more on persistence you can download a podcast of a talk I recently gave at Global Heart Spiritual Center in Santa Rosa, CA, "Persistence Trumps Talent."  Just click on the title of this article above to go to the download site.