Perseverance requires purpose, progress, people - and Perspective

Life can be tough. But I’ve only recently discovered just how tough. To persevere, I’m learning you need purpose, progress, people - and one more thing:

Perspective.

Purpose gets you started.

Progress keeps you moving.

People help along the way - if you ask them to.

But only the right perspective gives all that effort meaning.

After all, we can’t change what happens to us; only how we respond.

And what informs our response is how we choose to see the events that happen in the first place: our perspective.

The thoughts we have that shape what follows.

Because thoughts become words.

Words become deeds.

Deeds become habits.

And habits become character.

In tough times we’re tempted to think:

This wasn’t supposed to happen.

I never chose this.

Why me?

To persevere in the face of such powerlessness requires we change our perspective.

To focus on what we have - not on what we don’t.

To focus on accepting there are things we cannot change.

To focus on what we’re going to do next.

To spend our energy not on rueing what is past but on changing what is to come.

That perspective is a prerequisite for perseverance.