Why Starting Small is Your Best Guarantee for Success

A minor mental shift that will get you results

We’ve all been there.

You get excited about a new idea. A project, a new career, a skill you want to get good at. You hear about or witness others succeeding at it and start to dream big about where this new path will take you.

But after a few days, maybe weeks of trying it out, you lose focus, lose desire, and just give up before you’ve really set off. And this happens over and over again with many things you decide to pursue.

I’ve joined and quit gyms multiple times. I’ve picked up and given up on the guitar more times than I can count. I’ve decided to learn new IT skills many times, before getting ‘too busy’ with other stuff to actually get anywhere.

The struggle is real. And very common.

But the underlying problem has not so much to do with a lack of talent, motivation, or hard work, as it does with the expectations and goals you set yourself at the outset.

Don’t look at the mountain

“Don’t judge each day by the harvest you reap but by the seeds that you plant.” -Robert Louis Stevenson

The worst thing you can do for yourself is to set the bar too high.

Realistic expectations aren’t about how high you can go, rather about being conscious of the steps to be taken and the effort required.

Instant gratification is the devil. Comparison is the devil’s ugly little brother.

The first step is understanding that everything takes work and real results take time. Wanting to feel good in the moment and comparing yourself to others do nothing for you.

When I first joined the gym, I didn’t logically expect to become jacked overnight. I’d go maybe 5 times a week for about an hour each time, but after about three weeks of exercise that didn’t show me much progress, I lost motivation and just stopped.

And when I decided to try going into the field of data science, having done so much research and gotten excited about it, I barely even started because I felt I ‘had no time’.

The mental block I had was more to do with the scale of what I was trying to achieve in a given time frame. For the gym, I felt that exercise needed to be this 60-minute block of time every day. And I assumed, to make any progress in my career as a data scientist, that I’d need to sit down for hours each day to ever get anywhere.

The truth is that we can make time for the stuff we want to do, but more importantly, any time spent is valuable.

Exercise doesn’t need to be an hour at the gym. 5 minutes in your living room is progress. It’s a push in the right direction. Reading a 3-minute article on the course you want to pursue is knowledge that will bring you closer to your goal. Setting really small, achievable goals for yourself means even 1 minute of work makes a difference.

When you set the bar extremely low, every action feels like a win and you start to naturally raise the bar for yourself. Instead of feeling lousy looking at the big mountain ahead, make that little rock your first goal.

Make it easy for yourself

“We are what we repeatedly do. Excellence, then, is not an act, but a habit.” — Will Durant

To be successful in something, you need to create good habits.

Starting a new habit tends to be quite hard, and especially in the early stages, even the smallest obstacle can break your streak.

Removing every obstacle you can think of before you start is setting yourself up to succeed. For example, if you want to start waking up early but have difficulty getting up, put your alarm on the other side of the room before you sleep so that you aren’t tempted to snooze it. If you want to focus on something but are easily distracted, put your phone on airplane mode and find a peaceful, comfortable place to work, with less clutter and activity.

The fewer excuses you have not to do something, the easier it is to carry it out.

Something else that’s helpful in starting a new habit, is to attach it to something you already do.

For instance, while you wait for your partner to use the bathroom every morning, you could use that time to get in 4 minutes of exercise. If you can’t find the time in your day to meditate, try doing it for 2 minutes while the kettle boils for afternoon tea. Slotting your new habit into your everyday tasks prevents you from needing to find the time and makes the transition seamless.

A few minutes here and there may seem like nothing, but once the habit is formed, you start to see the effects and feel good about yourself. And that naturally leads to you wanting to do more.

We struggle to make changes in our lives. We sometimes never even start. Other times we put unrealistic expectations on ourselves and burn out soon after for biting off more than we can chew.

Patience is key. Success is a long game. Little efforts compound over time.

To transform your life takes simple and seemingly insignificant small steps. And that’s exactly why everyone should.

“The key to realizing a dream is to focus not on success but significance — and then even the small steps and little victories along your path will take on greater meaning.” — Oprah Winfrey