Tiny Changes Can Make a Huge Difference
It is often less overwhelming and more effective to make slight changes in behavior than taking major steps all at once.
Consider throwing a ball to hit a target. When we do this, our brains automatically perform incredibly complex math. When you throw that ball, you need to get the angle and the force precisely right. If your angle is only 5 degrees off, the ball will deviate from the intended course as it travels and will miss the target. The further it goes, the bigger the gap becomes.
This principle can work for us or against us. If we concentrate on improving one behavior and take small steps toward this goal, we will eventually hit our desired target. A single small deviation in behavior can have huge repercussions when amplified by time. If you don’t believe me, consider the following examples:
✅Let’s say that writing a book is on your bucket list. You could write one page each day. This doesn’t seem like a lot, but if you consider that many business books and novels are about 300 pages, you could easily write an entire book in a year!
✅What if you wanted to save money for a vacation at the end of the year. If you saved just $10 a day, you would have $3650 at the end of the year. This is a perfectly doable goal for most people.
Tiny changes to our mindsets, routines and lifestyles can help us achieve goals and can add up to overwhelming differences in our productivity, happiness, and performance.
In the book, “Atomic Habits,” James Clear explains how helpful small gains can be over an extended time. By setting a goal to improve by 1% each day, you will see at least 37% improvement by the end of the year!
If you want to improve your chances of making these improvements, James Clear recommends making the change obvious, attractive, easy to follow, and rewarding.
Let’s say you wanted to learn a new language because you will be traveling to another country at the end of the year. Make it attractive by connecting your intention to the upcoming vacation that excites you.
Having basic language capabilities will help you venture off the beaten path while on vacation, leading to more fun experiences. You could make it obvious by declaring your intention to a friend, colleague, or family member. You could make it easy by using an app, booking time in your calendar for 15-20 minutes of practice each day and setting a reminder alarm. Make it satisfying by celebrating your wins.
If you followed this plan, you would find that you have mastered basic conversational vocabulary in the new language which will be especially useful when you travel.
You might do something slightly differently every day, but over time that will add up to a greater and greater effect. This is particularly true in scenarios where there is a cumulative effect. It is ok to focus on the minutiae since tiny differences can add up to huge results!
Resources:
Book: Atomic Habits by James Clear
Article: “The Butterfly Effect: How Small Changes Lead to Big Progress” by Justin Thomas Miller