Over and over again—to this day—when I am tempted to procrastinate, to abandon a commitment, to desert an effort, I remind myself of the day I returned to the cross-country course as a teenager and did something I didn’t want to do. And in a heart-level dialogue with the part of me that lacks finishing-power, I say, “I finished then; I’m going to finish now. I did it well then; I’m going to do it well now.”
