I am a mother who knows how to be consistent.

But this used to be a real weakness for me.

I have always loved diving into a project, or chunky time, as I have heard it called, but even just a couple years ago I really struggled to do the things that needed attention every day.  Dishes, making my bed, homeschool devotional, math drills, writing, personal scriptures, journal, prayer, and exercise.  I would set a goal, and do well for a few weeks then it would peter off, till I was depressed with my failure and lack of stick-to-itiveness.
I wanted to  teach my children to know Jesus Christ, and love learning in every subject, and how to work hard.  I wanted to finish fixing up our house, and then maintain it well, and to study the gospel, and everything else, getting my own scholar phase, and grow real, healthy, nourishing food that I could feed my family.

In 2010, I hired a personal mentor to help me learn how to do it.  Jodie Palmer.  She did teach me, but it has taken until this past year that I have fully been able to understand the power of what she gave me.

One time, in my frustrations, she told me the story of the Tortoise and the Hare.  I could see that I was much more like the hare.  When I tried to do something, I would do it big, and fast, then I would get burned out, life would be out of balance, and I would do nothing more.  Like the hare, I would lay down and take a nap in the middle of the race.  She asked me why.  I realized that a part of me was afraid that with just slow, little steps I would never get to the finish line.  That the project or goal would be unraveled at the beginning before I ever made it to the end.  She asked me to give it a try.  To experiment with the small, steady, daily actions.  Jonathan bought me a tortoise, that I named "Connie," short for Constance.  I kept her in my pocket often to remind me of my need to do small efforts daily.  When

She taught me to make and keep commitments, and that goals and commitments are different.  As I was working with her, she did not let me set a daily commitment for several months, until I had a track record of keeping weekly commitments.  I was so excited the first time she let me set a daily commitment - it was very small - Read at least 1 verse every day.  Eventually, seeing that I could keep the small commitments gave me power to keep bigger ones.  Having to consistently report to her helped me be consistent for a time.

After my time working with her was over, I had to learn how to do it on my own.  That didn't come right away.

It took exercising faith in the principle, giving it a real try before I could believe it would work for me.  And my effort wasn't always constant.  But I have consistently kept trying to be consistent.

This past year I wanted to learn how to double-unders at Crossfit.  I spent several months doing them one at a time.  I would do one, then trip up on the rope.  I worked at them for a few minutes every day I went to the box.  After a couple months, I got a rythym of single, single, double, single, single, double where I could get 5 to 10 double-unders in.  Finally, after months of consistent trying and literally being in tears over them I strung 2 together.  Then I could only get 1 again.  A week later I got 6.  Then I started getting 2 and 3s more consistently.  Today I hit 75 unbroken for the second time.  Tomorrow I will be doing good to get a couple sets of 25.  When I can get 100 unbroken, most any time, I will consider the skill mastered.

This is how implementing every new skill or piece of knowledge goes for me.  Slowly and steadily, if I keep trying, it does improve.