This way, you can increase your perseverance.
Perseverance is the most striking characteristic of entrepreneurs. It is also the most frequently mentioned. Ask any group of people on the street what they think is a characteristic of entrepreneurs. Perseverance, endurance, persistence, or grit are the first words that they mention.
Scientific research also shows perseverance to be a trait that distinguishes the successful from the less successful entrepreneurs. In addition to perseverance, concepts such as grit, endurance, and persistence are also used. They don’t mean exactly the same thing, even though there is considerable overlap, but that’s an academic discussion. That is why we suffice with the term perseverance.
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Today or tomorrow?
Perseverance is necessary at times when things are not going well. When you are tired, you don’t feel like it anymore, encounter resistance, or experience setbacks. You want to give it up. Only then will your ability to persevere be appealed to.
Every person, including the entrepreneur, has and knows those moments. However, the successful entrepreneur thinks: “what I can do today, I don’t have to do tomorrow!” So they know how to raise the motivation and ability to go the extra mile.
Perseverance, grit, endurance, and tenacity are some of the most important traits of successful entrepreneurs.
However, when and where to draw the line between perseverance and chasing a lost cause is up to the individual entrepreneur. So, how do you know when to throw in the towel? The answer is self-awareness. When you have self-knowledge, you know when to say “no” or “enough is enough.”
Check out your entrepreneurial self-awareness. 
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Bears along the road
Perseverance is also crucial when you feel that you are not going to achieve what you want. Instead, you see your goal move away from you, further and farther away, instead of close by and sharper. Most people see bears at the end of the road. In other words, negative thoughts are slowly gaining the upper hand. Ideas that become increasingly convincing like: “This is not going to work.”
The business owner could also develop such thoughts, but the successful entrepreneur soon turns them into positive thoughts. He or she instinctively falls back to his or her motivation that inspired them to go into business in the first place. Often those bears along the way become teddy bears when you are further down the road.
It’s about the combination
Perseverance is related to other vital qualities, such as the need for achievement and personal effectiveness (self-confidence). It mainly has to do with motivation. If you want something very, very badly, it is easier to find the motivation to continue. Check with yourself when you really wanted something and what you did extra to get it, which you usually never would do. What do you want to achieve?
Tips to increase your perseverance
- Make sure you have very clear what you want to achieve. The more concrete, the better.
- If you don’t have a goal, and would instead work more intuitively, clarify what drives you.
- If you have a clear goal in mind, divide it into smaller, easily achievable steps.
- With every step taken, see if you can do a little more of the next step.
- Celebrate every step; reward has a strengthening effect in your brain and prepares you for the next step to be taken.
- Experiencing a setback? Take your distance. Look back and harness what you have already accomplished so far.
- Which also often helps when you have had a setback? Laugh about it and continue cheerfully 🙂
All your dreams can become true if you dare to keep them alive
Walt Disney
Read more about the difference between skills, abilities, knowledge, and competencies.