There's a quote that goes, “80% of success is showing up”.
It got me thinking, does that mathematically make sense? I applied it to my life. Whenever I didn't want to do something, I would do the bare minimum by just showing up. Being in the environment fostered the energy in me to participate more than the bare minimum. I'm not saying this is the case every time, but most of the time does the trick.
Now looking back at my life, there are a lot of places I could've practiced this that could've led to a better outcome. For example, I used to play basketball between the ages of 10-14 years old. I was a part of a coed team at the YMCA every season in those years. I took a break from basketball for a few years. I still played for fun, but I didn't have a routine, I'd play irregularly and didn't do much conditioning. In high school, I tried out for our basketball team every year for 3 years. Never was able to get a spot on the team because during tryouts I got tired quickly. My endurance was low. And I attribute that to not being consistent with running more frequently. I knew that was the main reason holding me back but I wasn't consistent with it.
As an adult, I'm experiencing the same thing in other aspects of my life. I start a routine, am good for a few weeks but then I regress back to old habits. Or with YouTube, I make and upload videos regularly for a few days and then lose momentum when I miss a day.
Consistency requires determination and resilience. That the most important part is be accountable and start again after failing. Nothing much else you can do.