Baby steps

Read time: 6 minutes

If I asked you today to run a marathon with no training could you possibly do it?

Maybe, but most likely not.

If, suppose, I pressed on an asked you “why couldn’t you do it now”, you would likely NOT say “that is inhumanly possible”, but rather “I didn’t train enough yet”.

Let me translate that:

You CAN and are definitely able to run a marathon.

The only reason you can’t do it right now is that you haven’t spent enough time training for it.

In this past blog I’ve already talked about how small things add up over time, but today I want to really bring the point home and encourage you to go after crazy goals in an incredibly relaxed maner.

How to eat an elephant

When we think of change, most often we think of a “jump off a cliff moment”, we think of completely leaving behind everything we’ve been, but that’s just not the case.

In reality, change is granular.

The real progress is granular.

It’s true, it may not be as flashy as “making it big over night”, but it is a way more stable method of creating real change in your life.

When we decide to do just a little bit, over a long period of time, when we design a plan to actually keep us on track and we challenge ourselves, we just risk actually changing.

I am an example of this.

As much as I would like to say otherwise, I have never changed completely in one go.

Change for me has always been slow, almost impossibly small, but well designed and accommodated by a lot of grit.

You don’t need much to learn a new language.

20 minutes a day for 6 months will do.

You don’t need much to change careers.

10 hours of work a week will most likely do.

You don’t need a lifetime to learn art.

2 documentaries a week will do.

If nothing else I ever write will reach you, I hope you will remain with this:

“You can absolutely do ANYTHING in life.

You just can’t do EVERYTHING.

You are given the same 24 hours as everyone else.

It is up to you to be wise with your existance.

If you plan, analyse and do the work right, you can get anywhere in life, even on a very relaxed lifestyle.”

Planning

You have somehow been corrupted to learn a new language.

AWESOME!

Now I can already feel your excitement after 1 week of intense learning with over 2 hours of study per day.

You are doing incredibly well and… oh… what’s that?

Life happened?

You had to travel and now your whole routine has been ruined.

You couldn’t do the routine you set for yourself, so you gave it up altogether, or even worse, you’ve been beating yourself for doing such an awful job.

A month or so passes and the fire in your belly burns again.

YOU WANNA LEARN.

You go to the drawing board and you promiss yourself “THIS TIME I’m serious! I will buckle down for 2 months and learn for 5 hours a day!”

And so your journey begins and after a 11 days you get so tired of this language that you just throw in the towel, never to return again.

What can we learn from this?

First up, doing just a little bit and I mean a very little bit today will get you way further than doing nothing at all.

Secondly, going for too much will most likely result in either burnout, or frustration. No need to bite more than you can chew. Just a little bit will go a long way.

Thirdly, a marathon of small and continuous progress is much more beneficial than multiple sprints of a high density knowledge.

Getting ready for the challenges ahead will obviously be key.

Preparing mentally for the problems you will have to struggle with is essential in making a good plan of attack for that new habits, but seriously, don’t get stuck in that.

All that being said, a READY – FIRE – AIM approach is much more beneficial for actually getting more from our habits.

You don’t need to have all of the answers, and trust me: You will NOT have thought of everything beforehand.

Failuare will happen, that’s just a fact.

It is just important how prepared we are and how we deal with it.

Dealing with failuare

You are amazing!

One whole month of doing your pushups every day in the morning.

Just incredible!

But there’s something in the back of the mind… There’s a small buzz creeping in and making you really uncomfortable.

It is the mental pressure you have put on yourself to keep on track with your goals.

It is the discomfort you have gone to, the things you loved, but had to sacrifice for this habit.

But it doesn’t need to be this way.

There’s no good reason why you should feel afraid to fail.

Obviously you want to keep your streak going, but putting unnecesarry strain on your mental state will not help anyone.

That’s why I highly advise you plan ahead and create rules for when you fail.

1. The 2 day rule

This great idea I heard from Matt D'avella for how to count your streaks. 

You can skip your habits an unlimited amount of time as long as you are not doing it for 2 days in a row.

That means that you can skip going to the gym today, when you feel like absolute shit and would actually much better prefer to spend some quality time with your friends and not feel a single drop of shame as long as you are gonna continue your streak tommorow.

2. Flexible schedueling

Running in the evening instead of the morning may bring some problems for your discipline, but running is better than not running.

Don’t feel pressured to do something just because it’s in your calendar.

The whole purpose of putting that thing in your calendar is to help you find some time, not to make you HAVE TO DO IT.

Relax about when you have to do things, but don’t veer off too far from your disciplined rituals. 

3. Punishments

Remember those rubber bands for when you said negative things?

That was a way to train yourself not to do particular things using punishements (namely the act of attacking your wrist with a rubber band).

Again, the point is not to put mental stress onto yourself, but rather to get you to be accountable to yourself.

Next time when you miss your run, try imposing a small rule that will be enough of a punishement to keep you from wanting to fail.

Examples:

DISCLAIMER: All of the above are just ideas.

They are just principles by which to lead a better life.

Life will obviously happen and we will obviously have to deal with stuff and miss our deadlines, no matter prepared we are for everything.

Don’t beat yourself up, keep your head raised high, look straight & up and most importantly, remember that you’re doing what you are doing in order to lead a better life, so make sure that your habits are providing you with a better life.

I will leave you with a more in-depth conversation on the topic by the author of one of my favorite books of all time, James Clear: