Why Mental Toughness Matters

No matter who you are or what you do, life is going to be hard, and it's going to present you with times and situations that are extremely hard. The biggest difference between the people who make it through these hard times and the people who don't: Mental toughness.

It is the difference between changing your life for the better and staying where you're at right now.
It's a skill you can cultivate to propel you toward building the life you truly want vs staying stuck where you are.
It's rejecting self-wallowing and pity.
It's choosing the uncomfortable situations that promote growth vs seeking comfort.
It's the ability to endure through the pain and struggle no matter how badly you want to quit.
That's mental toughness.

WHY MENTAL TOUGHNESS MATTERS
Without mental toughness, your biggest goals in life will only be dreams. It's the single most important skill you need to be successful in anything you do. The truth is, there is no easy path. Hardship is inevitable whether you think it is or not. It's a constant in the journey to becoming great and building anything of real significance.

When you face struggle.
When the journey becomes mundane.
When the odds are stacked against you.
When there is very little certainty.

When the conditions are far from ideal, you need the mental toughness to overcome these challenges and keep moving. That's why mental toughness matters. If carrying through with the promises you make to yourself and reaching your goals is important to you, then mental toughness is the answer.

Through cultivating and exercising mental toughness, you can also build several other skills that will serve you greatly.

Skills such as:
Confidence
Grit
Mental fortitude
Self-belief
Self-worth
Resilience
Perseverance

Mental toughness will eliminate all feelings of self-doubt and put you in the driver's seat of your life. You will have all the control.

HOW TO DEVELOP MENTAL TOUGHNESS
Just like elite athlete’s train and practice to strengthen their muscles and increase endurance, mentally tough people have worked to develop their mental strength. The best way to develop mental toughness is to adopt the habits and traits of these mentally tough people.

What do mentally tough people look like?
How do they act?
What do they do? 
This is how they build mental toughness.

1. MENTALLY TOUGH PEOPLE DON'T FEEL SORRY FOR THEMSELVES
Here’s a fact that you need to accept: Life is not fair. Every day, you will face obstacles and challenges that push you to your limits. It happens to everyone. You’re not special. The fact is, you can’t sit around and feel sorry for yourself. Sure, you can get mad when these things happen to you but use that anger productively to make your life better instead of sitting around, doing nothing, and pouting about how bad you have it. Sitting around and feeling sorry for yourself has never made anyone’s life better. Get up and get moving.

2. MENTALLY TOUGH PEOPLE EMBRACE CHANGE
Let’s be real: CHANGE IS HARD. If you’re overweight and out of shape, it’s going to be hard to consistently follow a nutrition plan, exercise, and lose weight. Change is uncomfortable and challenging, but improving your life and building mental toughness requires change.

If you want to work on making things better for yourself, you must start embracing change. Don't look at change as additional struggles you have to work through. Think of change as an opportunity to grow and become a better version of yourself.

3. MENTALLY TOUGH PEOPLE FOCUS ON WHAT THEY CAN CONTROL
Let's say you have Type 1 Diabetes. That isn’t fun but you can’t really control the fact that your body doesn’t manage blood sugar on its own. What can you control?

You can control how much you exercise.
You can control what you eat.
You can control how much water you drink.
You can even control whether you take the
medicine your doctor may give you.

So, while diabetes itself might not be in your control, everything related to it is. That’s the key when it comes to becoming mentally tough. You need to be aware of all the things that are affecting you and your life but you can’t dwell on the things you can’t change. You must focus on the things you can control, and let the universe handle the things you can’t. Focusing on the things that our outside of your control is not just a waste of your time.  It can hold you back from becoming the best version of yourself.

4. MENTALLY TOUGH PEOPLE LEARN AND GROW FROM THEIR PAST
Practice makes perfect. We've all heard that hundreds of times and it’s true. You’ll never build mental toughness unless you’re willing to face your past (including all the dumb things you did), learn from it, and do better next time. There’s no real way around it, but you shouldn't dwell on the past and let it negatively affect your mindset.

Instead, you need to learn from it, so you don’t make the same mistakes again and again. By using your past experiences to learn what NOT to do you can better recognize when a situation isn't going to benefit your future growth and fix it. If you want to avoid a cycle of making the same mistakes repeatedly you need to be self-aware enough to not repeat those mistakes.

5. MENTALLY TOUGH PEOPLE SET BOUNDARIES FOR THEMSELVES AND HOLD THEM
You need to take risks in life. If you have goals, which you must if you're reading this, the only way to make a change is to take a risk.
You're going to have to get uncomfortable, but also know when to draw the line.
People who are mentally tough know how to put themselves and their goals first.
They know how to say no to people who are holding them back.
Mentally strong people also know when it's time to step on the gas and go after their goals.

The best thing you can do is say "no" to things that don't benefit you, or your future success. This can be uncomfortable for you at first, but as you come to realize how much saying "no" can help you ... you'll have no problem saying it to people when it's necessary.

6. MENTALLY TOUGH PEOPLE DEFINE THEIR OWN SUCCESS
Our society tries to tell us what success looks like.
Go to college.
Get a job working 9-5.
Do these things ... and you'll be able to buy an average home
In an average neighborhood.
With an average white picket fence.
And an average yard.

All of that is great and honestly, it's everything that most people want, but you're not like most people. Your goals are much higher than that. The best things in life are not given to you. You must earn them, and it will require a great deal of mental toughness to make it all happen. Why? Because most people who don’t understand your vision won’t see it as you are working toward your dreams.

They’ll tell you that you’re wasting your time and you need to start "taking life seriously."
They'll try to drag you down to their level because they feel threatened that you're trying to become better than they are.

YOU know what YOU want.

Don’t let them fool you into thinking that you're failing or wasting your time. Define what success means to you and chase it with everything you've got.

7. MENTALLY TOUGH PEOPLE LEARN HOW TO LIVE WITH DISCOMFORT
Change comes at a cost.
The cost of a big paycheck is working long hours to become a person of true value and significance.
The cost of being good at a sport is hours of practicing and drills.
The cost of losing weight is working out and following a nutrition plan consistently.
The cost of a big paycheck is working long hours and weekends.

No matter what you want to do, there's always a price. You will have to sacrifice things that you may not want to, and it may get uncomfortable. That sacrifice is necessary for you to reach your goals and live the life you want to live.

Mentally tough people learn how to deal with discomfort and use the pressure it creates as a driving force to perform better. It's even good to seek out discomfort from time-to-time. It helps you continue to grow and improve your mental toughness.

8. MENTALLY TOUGH PEOPLE ARE RESILIENT
Are you someone who quits at the first sign of resistance or are you someone who pushes through, regardless of the challenge? If you want to build mental toughness, start with your ability to stick with whatever it is you set out to do, no matter what challenges get in the way.

Be resilient.

This is something all mentally tough people excel at. They have massive amounts of resilience.
They can withstand any form of adversity and still reach their goals.
They can take the doubt and negativity and use it as fuel for productive action.

When you are resilient, you are in control of your response to the environment and the challenges you face. How you respond in these situations is everything, and when it comes to building mental toughness, you must be resilient.

 9. MENTALLY TOUGH PEOPLE STRIVE FOR PERSONAL EXCELLENCE
Mentally tough people are anything but complacent. In fact, they are the opposite. They are constantly working at becoming the best version of themselves and improving in every area of life. Whether it's their health and fitness.

Their career.
Their business.
Their relationships.
Their skill set.
Or anything in between.

Mentally tough people are always striving for greatness. It's through consistently challenging themselves and making these commitments that they can build and refine their mental toughness. 

MENTALLY TOUGH PEOPLE RULE THE WORLD
Nobody ever does anything great by being mentally weak. Change and success requires a ton of mental strength. You’ve got to put the effort into becoming mentally tough, or nothing will change.