The Small Wins Matter

I wanted to follow up on my message yesterday because of some feedback I received about the topic and my thoughts. In yesterday’s newsletter, I spoke about the importance of chasing goals that were hard, with high risk of failure. I believe chasing difficult goals is a great way to grow as a person. At the same time, I want to emphasize the importance of celebrating the small wins along the journey.

Small wins can be anything and should serve the purpose of showing progress while also instilling a sense of accomplishment. Small wins act as the stepping stones to achieving the larger goals. Small wins can also be “easier” goals that you can mentally keep track of as a win. These wins act as positive feedback mechanisms in the face of adversity, motivating you to keep going. I am not against setting easy goals because I recognize what a feeling of success can do. I am against only using easy goals if there is no strain felt when trying to achieve them. The strain is where we grow, and the easy goals help us keep going.

I set annual goals which I then track on a monthly and daily basis. Breaking down my annual goals into smaller time intervals serves as my personal set of “smaller” or “easier” goals to achieve. Having a system where progress is accurately tracked and achieved helps me stay driven to achieve the more difficult, annual goals. I also believe having this sort of system helps shape my perspective in the event I fail to achieve my annual goals. For example, if I fail to run 1,000 miles over the course of 2023, I will have failed my goal from a factual basis. However, if I run 800 miles, I can still frame it in a positive way because those 800 miles would be more than double what I did in 2022.

By setting hard goals I am opening up myself for failure. In order to not be discouraged by the sight of failure I look to the short-term successes. These short-term achievements then compound into success over the long run. I previously wrote about “winning the seconds.” That framework can also be applied when thinking of the small wins in your life. If your goal is to lose 50 pounds over a year, celebrate losing 1 pound in a week, or go even more granular and celebrate only eating 1 serving of ice cream instead of 2. Small wins are everywhere and are the foundation for getting us closer to the mountaintop of where we want to be. Celebrate them and continue on.