During December I got a notification to say that I had reached 50 blog posts. It caught me slightly off guard. I knew I had been writing more consistently throughout 2025, but I had not clocked that it had added up to fifty. When I thought about it properly, it made perfect sense – roughly one post a week for the year. Nothing heroic. Nothing dramatic. Just showing up.
What that small notification really highlighted for me was something I have come to see again and again. Consistency is where the magic lies.
The quiet power of showing up
In The Slight Edge, Jeff Olson talks about how the slight edge is always working, either for us or against us. There is no standing still. That idea has stuck with me because it feels so true when I look back on my own life. Progress is rarely the result of one big moment. It is the accumulation of small, often unremarkable actions taken consistently over time.
I can also see the opposite. There have been periods where I have become comfortable and subconsciously sat back to admire what I had created. Nothing obviously went wrong at first. But a few months later, or sometimes a couple of years, I would look around and realise that a quiet kind of atrophy had set in. Use it or lose it, as the saying goes. Not through failure or drama, just through a lack of movement.
Why consistency beats intensity
We are often drawn to big moves. Grand plans. Short bursts of effort that promise fast results. They are exciting and they make for good stories, but they rarely last. Consistency on the other hand does not ask for heroics. It asks for commitment.
Doing something regularly, even when motivation is low, builds a rhythm. That rhythm reduces friction and over time it becomes part of who you are rather than something you are trying to force. Whether it is writing, training, coaching, learning or leading, steady progress consistently applied compounds in ways that are hard to appreciate day to day, but impossible to ignore in hindsight.
That realisation is exactly what that simple note about fifty blog posts gave me. It was not about the number. It was about the pattern behind it.
Direction still matters
Consistency on its own is not enough. If you are consistent but heading in the wrong direction, you simply get very good at something that does not serve you. This is where clarity comes in.
I see this a lot… people work hard, stay busy and pride themselves on effort, yet feel stuck or frustrated. Often the missing piece is not motivation but intention. Where are you actually heading and why does it matter to you?
This thinking is a big part of why I created my new coaching programme, Built With Intention. Consistency is the engine, but direction sets the course. Once you have a sense of where you want to go, small daily actions start to align naturally. They stop feeling random and begin to make sense.
Pausing without stopping
One of the misconceptions about consistency is that it means never stopping or questioning yourself. In reality the opposite is true – pausing to take stock is part of staying consistent over the long term.
Regular reflection allows you to notice what is working, what is no longer serving you and what might need adjusting. The key is that the pause is intentional and not an excuse to drift. You can change direction without abandoning momentum.
The long game
Hitting fifty blog posts did not change my life but it did remind me of something important – meaningful progress is usually quiet. It rarely announces itself until you look back and join the dots.
Here’s to the next fifty. Not rushed. Not forced. Just built steadily, with intention.
Patrick Hickman 