Estimated reading time: 2 minutes, 33 seconds.
TODAY’S IDEA: Make tiny decisions
— From REWORK: Change the way you work forever by Jason Fried and David Heinemeier Hansson
Life seems to be marked by big-decisions that take us down specific paths in which we want to go. But if you stop and think about it, “big decisions are hard to make and hard to change,” say the authors of Rework, Jason Fried and David Heinemeier Hansson.
Fried and Hansson go on to say, “Once ego and pride are on the line, you can’t change your mind without looking bad. […] And then there’s inertia too: the more steam you put into going in one direction, the harder it is to change course.”
Instead of making big decisions, the authors’ advice is to make tiny ones, so that we can’t make big mistakes. When we make choices that are small enough, as it turns out, they’re effectively temporary and we can change them or fix them if something goes wrong. “There’s no big penalty if you mess up. You just fix it.”
Yet, with the joy of having made a big decision that turned out right, comes the desire of making more big decisions and achieving more. So, how do we reconcile this?
“Making tiny decisions doesn’t mean you can’t make big plans or think big ideas. It just means you believe the best way to achieve those big things is one tiny decision at a time.”
And this makes perfect sense because every large project, plan, idea or goal is comprised of a series of small actions, that when linked together give us that big result. In reality, big decisions come as a collection of tiny ones that resulted in you now having the ability to make that big decision. And once you make it, you can start moving forward via tiny decisions that will ultimately bring you the desired results. Breaking it down into tiny decisions or tiny components is the key.
The authors cite explorer Ben Saunders who achieved a daunting North Pole expedition: 31 marathons back-to-back, 72 days alone. “His ‘huge decision’ was often so horrifically overwhelming to contemplate that his day-to-day decision making rarely extended beyond ‘getting to that bit of ice a few yards in front of me.’ ”
Just remember that attainable goals are always those that you can break down into little steps by making tiny decisions.
“Great things are done by a series of small things brought together.” – Vincent Van Gogh
ACTION
TODAY: What is a big decision or big goal that you have in front of you? Think of tiny decisions that you can make that will move you closer in that direction.
FUTURE: As you contemplate making big decisions, contemplate as well the series of small ones that you will take—at least initially—to get going. This way you will be able to accomplish them and build on: you finish one, and move on to the next. Give yourself permission to make mistakes, they’ll be tiny, after all, and you will learn from them, be able to course-correct, and move on until you reach your goal.
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