Persistence is rather difficult to achieve. If you have decided to not give in to your cravings for hot chocolate lava cake, persistence is the key. If you want to become more committed to your goals, persistence is the key. Before you blame your lack of willpower for failing to stay consistent on anything, consider this: building mental strength takes only a few minutes a day. 

As for me, building mental strength is similar to building physical strength. Building macho muscles might take only 30 minutes a day but doing it consistently has a tremendous impact. The same can be said about building mental strength. With just a few minutes of training daily, you can enable your brain to think differently, cope with things differently, and behave productively. With consistent efforts, you will build mental strength sooner than later. 

The good news that I ultimately want to say is no matter who you are or who you believe you are, you can build mental strength with a few simple habits and practices that I am going to suggest to you below:

• You are limited only by your thoughts: 

If you believe that you can do something, you can do that. No energy in the entire cosmos will stop you from doing it or reaching there, if you believe in yourself and have the confidence to do it. It is pretty tough to stay mentally strong when you are constantly being surrounded by self-doubt, negative thoughts, negative people, and self-limiting beliefs. 

• I am not smart enough to do that
• I do not have experience. 
• What if I fail? 

These self-limiting thoughts crowd out the ability to think positively. Don’t let negativity occupy your mind’s space. Fill your brain with positivity that negativity doesn’t find space to get in altogether. If you are occupied with self-limiting thoughts, chase them out with these self-affirmations:

• I am smart enough
• I have the capability to do it. 
• I may not have the experience but I do commit to doing it. 
• I might have failed but that doesn’t mean I am going to fail every time. 

• Positive mindset:

A positive mindset has the power of moving even mountains. If you are resolute to build mental strength then shift half of the energy in developing a positive mindset. Identify your negative thoughts and replace them with productive thoughts. Conquer your negative thoughts before they start influencing your behaviour. 

• Practice mindfulness: 

You cannot build your future with your past dictating your actions. Mindfulness is being present in the moment. Since the only moment, you can change yourself is now, invest your energy only in the present but nothing else. Only if you can control your present, can you shape your future. A few psychological studies suggest that mindfulness has a multitude of physical and psychological stress. 

• Reflect on your daily progress: 

To develop any life skill, reflecting on the progress is a must stop. At the end of the day reflect on your thoughts and actions and ask yourself what you have learned. Plan what you hope to improve tomorrow and strive to accomplish it. 

• The 4 C’s: 

The below mentioned 4C strategy helps you identify, recognize, and realize your mental toughness:

• Control: The first component of mental toughness is ‘control’ which helps you realize if you are in control of your own life. You should be able to control your thoughts and emotions- less likely to expose and reveal them to others. 
• Commitment: commitment is the greatest strength you will have to build over time. Commitment takes persistence, patience, motivation, and focus. To be high on the commitment scale means staying fully focused on goals and resolute to achieve them. You are committed in the sense you are consistently trying to achieve who you want to be. Be committed and don’t let laziness, distractions, and other impediments creep into your mind and life. 
• Challenge: This resembles to which extent you are committed and driven by your goal. To be high on the challenge scale means, you are committed to take challenges and achieve them no matter what. 
• Confidence: represents the extent to which you believe in yourself, your abilities, and your goals. To be high on the confidence scale means you are resolute in finishing your tasks and reaching your goals. 

Be mindful of the negative thoughts and bad habits that might creep into your mind and life. Feeling sorry, giving up, and regrets are the first failures. Don’t submit to your weakness. Fight against them. Give up all the unhealthy habits and remember to work smart and not hard. Developing mental toughness is a work in progress. There is always room for improvement. The human brain is the most vulnerable thing to distractions. You must be extremely cautious and careful to stay on track of productive habits. Else, it doesn’t take long to fall back into the abyss. Once you have started improving, you have to focus equally on improving more and not letting the negative and unproductive things creeping in again.