As I was scrolling on Instagram, I came across a post from an old friend in college who is now a bodybuilder. She published a photo of herself in her bodybuilder stance, showing off her toned and defined physique with the caption: “You must first forget inspiration. Creating the habit is more dependable. Habits will sustain you whether you’re inspired or not.”

That caption blew my mind, and I felt it was only right to share it with you because of its truth. Inspiration eventually wears off, but the repetition of good habits stays with you for the long haul. Christina’s starting weight was 230 pounds, while her current weight at the time was 130 pounds. She needed more than just inspiration to transform her physique into the person she is today; she needed the daily repetition of good habits to become disciplined.

Ten years ago, when I was working as a radio personality in Columbus, Georgia, I had great career aspirations, such as writing a book on my struggles as a college student that led to where I was in my career at that time. But I lacked the discipline to plan out my writing schedule or even to create an outline for my book. I was too lazy to write my own book; instead, I hired a ghostwriter, and we would weekly record my responses to the questions she asked me and would later transcribe for the book.

In short, the book was never finished because I lacked the discipline to follow through on the weekly meetups, on top of the many bad habits I practiced, all of which halted my progress. This may sound silly, but at that time I believed success was supposed to happen to me somewhat magically because of the household name I had built for myself around town. I had my head in the clouds. In my mind, my book was supposed to happen because I said it was going to happen, but not by actually putting in the work and developing good habits to make it happen.