The Fine Line Between Consistency and Insanity

How to tell if you’re on the path to mastery or just stuck in a cycle that’s not working

May 22, 2025

We’ve all heard the definition of insanity: Doing the same thing over and over again and expecting a different result.

And yet… most of us are living inside it without realizing it.

We think we’re being consistent. We’re showing up. We’re doing the work. But if we zoom out for a second, we’re not actually progressing. We’re stuck in a loop. Same thoughts. Same actions. Same emotions. Same results.

That’s not consistency. That’s insanity.

There’s a fine line between consistency and insanity and most people blur it without even knowing. I know, because I’ve been there. I’ve mistaken repetition for progress. I’ve stayed loyal to routines that kept me stuck, thinking I was being disciplined. I called it dedication, but really, I was just afraid to try something different. Afraid that if I changed the approach, it meant I had failed.

But the moment I broke out of the loop, when I finally saw the pattern for what it was and recognized what I had been doing…I felt free. Clear. Like the fog had lifted and I could finally see the truth. And I am not kidding, 9 out of 10 times, that shift came from this exact realization.

That’s the power of awareness, it hands you your perspective back. And once you have that, you can finally choose something new. You realize you’re not broken. You’re just running an old program, one that used to serve you but is no longer aligned with who you’re becoming.

This is how transformation actually happens. Not from trying harder but from seeing differently. From noticing the pattern, disrupting the cycle, and being bold enough to experiment with a new way forward. Mastery doesn’t come from doing the same thing over and over—it comes from curiosity, adjustment, and the courage to pivot.

You’re not meant to stay stuck. You’re meant to evolve.

What Insanity Actually Looks Like

Insanity doesn’t always feel chaotic. It feels safe, familiar, responsible, even. You’re following the routine. You’re checking the boxes. You’re doing what “should” work.

But subconsciously you might be wondering:

Why isn’t anything changing?
Why do I feel stuck in a rut?
Why does it feel like I’m doing everything right, but I am not seeing the results I was expecting?

Because you’re stuck in the loop. The feedback loop of sameness. And your nervous system loves it. Even when it’s not serving you.

It’s not that you’re doing nothing, it’s that you’re doing the same thing. Thinking the same thoughts. Reacting with the same emotions. Making the same micro-decisions that reinforce the same identity. And because the brain craves certainty over success, it keeps you in what’s familiar, even if it’s also unfulfilling.

You tell yourself you’re being consistent. That this is just part of the process. That maybe if you keep pushing, something will shift.

But growth isn’t found in repetition without reflection. It’s found in the tweak. The shift. The bold moment where you question your default and choose something new.

Insanity feels responsible until it starts to cost you your joy, your time, your energy, your potential.

Consistency evolves. Insanity repeats. Know the difference.

The Neuroscience Behind the Loop

Your brain is wired for efficiency, not success.

It craves patterns. Predictability. Familiarity. It wants to conserve energy, so it keeps firing the same neural pathways over and over again, regardless of whether you’re actually getting you what you want. And it really does not care if it’s keeping you stuck because that is all it knows.

So…You take action. You wait for the result. It doesn’t come. And instead of shifting your approach, you double down because you’ve been told to be consistent. But no one told you that you might just be reinforcing insanity.

When things don’t work, your brain starts spinning:

"I’ve tried everything."
"Why does this keep happening to me?"
"Something must be wrong with me."
"Maybe it’s just not meant for me..."

Your brain wants answers so it grabs for the most familiar ones. It recycles old proof from the past. It serves you thoughts that feel safe, even if they’re disempowering.

And then what happens? You focus on those thoughts. And what you focus on…you get more of.

Enter your Reticular Activating System (RAS) which is your brain’s internal filter. It’s scanning your environment every second of the day, sorting through billions of bits of information to find what matches your current beliefs and focus.

So if you’re broadcasting “It’s not working,” your RAS says: “Got it! Let me show you all the ways that’s true.”

You’ll miss opportunities. Downplay your progress. Ignore the small signs of change. Even sabotage forward movement because it doesn’t match the signal you’re unconsciously sending.

That’s how powerful your mind is. It’s not just creating your thoughts, it’s curating your reality.

Until you learn how to shift the signal, you’ll keep running the same loop… and calling it discipline.

The Difference Between Consistency and Insanity

People confuse the two all the time.

Insanity = same approach, same inputs, no changes, no awareness.
Consistency = steady action + micro-adjustments + feedback + reflection.

Most people think they’re being consistent when really…they’re just being insane. They’re stuck in a loop, doing the same thing over and over, hoping it finally works, but never stopping to ask: Is this actually working? What needs to change? What is one thing I can do differently to get a different outcome?

Consistency is the stepping stone to mastery. But mastery doesn’t come from mindless repetition, it comes from intentional experimentation. Mastery means understanding something from every angle. It’s not doing the same thing a thousand times, it’s tweaking one variable at a time until you deeply know what works.

Kobe Bryant didn’t just shoot the same jump shot over and over. He studied every detail. He asked questions no one else was asking: What if I shifted my foot placement by an inch? What if I adjusted the release point? What if I practiced with my eyes closed to feel the rhythm instead of relying on sight? He approached even the basics like dribbling with relentless curiosity. He was refining his game layer by layer.

Michael Phelps trained the same way. He didn’t just swim laps, he obsessively fine-tuned every stroke, every breath, every turn. He visualized his races in full detail thousands of times before ever getting in the pool. He and his coach tracked data, adjusted techniques, and mentally rehearsed every possible scenario including losing his goggles, which actually happened in a gold medal race…and he still won. Because mastery isn't just muscle—it’s mental, emotional, and energetic alignment.

Consistency keeps you in the game. Experimentation is what moves you forward.

Think about it:

If someone told you it takes 100 tries to get it right (whatever “it” is) you wouldn’t quit after attempt #12. You wouldn’t spiral or say, “Maybe it’s not meant for me.” You’d just say: “Cool, that one didn’t work. Let’s tweak and try again.”

No drama. No shame. Just data. You wouldn’t make it mean something about you. You’d think: “Alright, 88 more to go. Let’s beat that timeline.”

You also wouldn’t keep doing the exact same thing on repeat, expecting a different outcome. Because if you knew it didn’t work that way then you’d change it.

And that’s why the quote is famous…. Thomas Edison didn’t try the same way 10,000 times. He discovered 10,000 ways NOT to build a lightbulb.

Here is the other thing most people miss in the equation: Themselves.

They hyperfocus on the action. They analyze the strategy, the steps, the external approach. But they never stop to look at the energy, mindset, and emotion behind it all. You cannot create something new from the same state of being that created the problem in the first place.

Another famous quote for a reason: "You can’t solve a problem from the same level of consciousness that created it." – Einstein

So yes, we want to tweak and refine the action but we also have to tweak and shift the energy behind it. Because the truth is, your thoughts, your emotions, your internal state…they shape everything. This is why deeply knowing yourself is the key to unlocking everything you want in life. The strategy matters, but who you are while you’re doing it matters more. Everyone should be running to do the inner work right now because that’s where the real answers live.

This is how it may show up: You launch something in your business from fear. So fear of not being good enough, fear of needing to prove yourself. Even if you do all the “right” steps, the energy underneath it is scarcity. And that energy is often rooted in subconscious beliefs you don’t even realize are running the show. Beliefs like “I’m not worthy of success” or “I have to hustle to be loved.” So the launch flops. And instead of looking at the mindset, the emotional driver, or the belief behind it all, you blame the offer, the algorithm, the timing.

But the two go hand in hand always. The energetic and the physical. The underlying root from which you’re taking action, and the action itself. You can’t separate them. The strategy may look good on paper, but if it’s built on fear, doubt, or lack…the results will reflect that.

But if you were actually tweaking what didn’t work and one of those tweaks was launching that same offer from a place of calm, grounded certainty and self-trust… from a place of knowing its value and believing it was the most powerful thing someone could say yes to. Then the result would change. Because you changed.

Your mindset and energy are part of the strategy. They’re not optional. They are foundational.

Mastery Is Built on Micro-Tweaks

James Dyson created 5,126 failed prototypes before he landed on the one that worked. That’s over five thousand times of tweaking, testing, and learning what didn’t work.
Most people would have quit at failure #10. Maybe even #3.

But Dyson didn’t see failure as the end. He saw it as data. As one more step closer. That’s the mindset of mastery. And it’s one we’ve lost in a world built on instant gratification.

We expect results as fast as a package delivery or a dopamine hit. We want the win after one try, the clarity after one journal session, the success after one launch. And when it doesn’t happen instantly, we spiral. We assume something’s wrong. With the plan. Or worse, with ourselves.

I can say all of this because I was one of them. When I first launched my business at the end of 2022, I thought it was going straight to the moon. I truly believed that if I had the passion and put in the effort, everything would take off instantly.

Spoiler alert: it didn’t.

But now I can see it clearly from this new lens. If I’m meant to help people solve the real problems in their lives, then I need to understand those problems on every level. What works. What doesn’t. Where people get stuck. The traps, the patterns, the subconscious beliefs that keep them looping.

I had to go through it myself to see it clearly. Because true mastery requires experience not just success, but struggle, missteps, and course-corrections. That’s how I have become who I am now. And that’s how I know how to lead others through it. And that’s why I’ll never stop doing this because as long as I keep learning, I’ll keep growing. And if I keep growing, I’ll always have more to give.

Mastery isn’t doing the same thing 10,000 times. That’s what the world of hustle teaches you: just push harder, grind longer, repeat the process until something sticks.

Coming from a sales lens (which used to be my corporate job in tech) I know how easy it is to fall into that trap. You send the same outreach email every day, hoping the results will magically change. You deliver the same pitch you’ve memorized like the back of your hand, even though it stopped landing months ago. You call it consistenc but really, it’s autopilot. It’s checking boxes. It’s staying busy instead of being effective.

We’ve lost the love of mastering things and replaced it with a race to completion. But if you want to be great. If you want to lead, innovate, or build something that lasts
you have to fall back in love with the process. Because mastery doesn’t come from doing more. It comes from doing it better.

True mastery is doing 10,000 things, 10,000 ways, until the truth reveals itself. It’s curiosity. It’s refinement.

The first version isn’t meant to be perfect. Neither is the 5th. Or the 50th. But every version is showing you something. Every attempt gives you more clarity. More awareness. More feedback to fine-tune the next move.

Mastery is about collecting data not judgment. It’s about curiosity over criticism. It’s about staying in the game with yourself, not against yourself.

And it requires a certain mindset:

One that sees setbacks as stepping stones.
One that understands failure isn’t a dead end but that it’s proof that you’re in motion.
One that can zoom out and say, “I’m getting closer,” instead of “I’m not there yet.”
One that knows true progress and greatness come from what you overcome, not just what comes easily.
One that recognizes when things are going well, that’s often when we get lazy… when we stop iterating, stop questioning, stop refining.
One that trusts the process, even when the results haven’t shown up yet.
One that’s more committed to the long game than the quick win.
One that’s willing to look at self first before blaming anything outside of them.
One that understands that how you do it matters just as much as what you do.

That’s why celebration matters. Not just at the finish line but at every step along the path.

Every tweak, every insight, every shift in energy or perspective is progress. And when you start treating those moments like wins, you reinforce the belief that it’s working. And once that belief takes root, your mind starts scanning for proof. And now the “what we focus on, we get more of” starts working in your favor. Because you’re not just hoping it’s working…you’re proving that it is.

And that’s how mastery becomes inevitable.

We’ve Forgotten How to Master Life

We’ve gotten lost in only celebrating the big wins. And at the same time, we’ve gotten hooked on instant gratification—needing results now, needing validation now, needing it all to work right now.

We’ve forgotten how to celebrate the small stuff. How to see daily progress as a win. How to treat something not working as valuable feedback, not a failure.

We’ve stopped showing up with the mindset of mastery. And instead, we spiral into burnout because we’re stuck in insanity, not growth.

We want the result without the reps. The clarity without the confusion. The transformation without the discomfort. But life is about mastery. It’s about growth. That is the point.

Living is the goal. Learning is the process. Yet most of us are stuck in a personal version of Groundhog Day…same thoughts, same behaviors, same actions, same mindset, same energy, same emotions.

And then we wonder why nothing changes. We wonder why the same things keep happening to us. It’s not that we’re not trying, it’s that we’re not thinking like masters.

To master something means to fully understand it. It means to study it, test it, refine it, and make adjustments. It means going all in. Getting to 100%. Not throwing things out when they don’t work immediately, but iterating. Like we do in business.

We need to bring that same mindset into our lives. Our relationships. Our health. Our emotional world. Our purpose. Every single area.

Most people aren’t broken. They’re just misinformed.

They’ve never been taught to look beneath the surface, to uncover the real things disrupting their growth. To recognize their thoughts, emotions, and beliefs as part of the equation, not obstacles to avoid.

Emotions are quietly running our lives. And without the right tools to understand, release, and work with them, they become heavy. Loud. Even destructive. The fear. The doubt. The worry. The belief that something out there will finally fix what’s been missing in here.

But you don’t need fixing. You need mastery.

And mastery begins the moment you stop trying to escape the discomfort…and start learning from it. Start working with it. Start becoming through it.

Because everything you’re seeking—clarity, confidence, peace, fulfillment—
is waiting for you on the other side of what you’ve been trying to avoid.

And if you’re thinking, “I don’t even know what to master…” Start with yourself.

Master yourself. Master your life. Because when you become the one in control of your mind, your energy, your emotions you become unstoppable.

It starts with being radically honest with yourself.

Where are you actually at? What’s really driving your actions? Is it clarity or fear? Alignment or autopilot? Past, Present, or Future?

My secret to life is treating it like a science experiment. Realize that you’re not behind. You’re not broken. You’re just in the lab.

But if you want a different result, you have to be honest about both the inputs and the outputs of your life…

Are you evolving your thoughts, your beliefs, your energy? Or are you hoping that a stale approach will magically lead to a fresh outcome?

And are you actually looking at the data in your life—your emotions, your patterns, your outcomes? Or are you just hoping it’ll feel different without ever changing what you're putting in?

Are you being intentional with your actions? Or are you just busy, hoping that motion will create meaning?

Are you repeating what's familiar? Or risking something new that could actually move you forward?

We don’t need more effort. We need more awareness. More presence. More reflection. More intention behind each move.

Stop calling it consistency if you’re just stuck in a loop. Check yourself: are you in insanity?

If you’re in a rut… if you’re feeling stuck…this is where you start.

Ask yourself honestly: Am I doing the same thing over and over and expecting a different result?

If so, I suggest you scroll back up…and read this again. Maybe even a few times. Because the moment you see it clearly, is the moment you can change it.

With love & gratitude,

Stephanie

Own it × Shift it × Become it.

1:1 Mindset Coaching