One Small Step Can Change Your Life

Kaizen.

You’ve probably heard about it by this point.

It’s awesome.

Here’s how Marci Shimoff puts it in her great book, Happy for No Reason (see Notes): “To make the quickest progress, you don’t have to take huge leaps. You just have to take baby steps—and keep on taking them. In Japan, they call this approach kaizen, which literally translates as ‘continual improvement.’ Using kaizen, great and lasting success is achieved through small, consistent steps. It turns out that slow and steady is the best way to overcome your resistance to change.”

Small, incremental change.

Continual improvement.

That’s where it’s at! :)

This is really cool.

What question do you think is going to stress you out more:

—> “How am I ever going to pay off my credit card debt?” (big question)

or

—> “What can I do in five minutes a day to reduce my credit-card debt?” (small question)

Right.

That’s not complicated.

The big questions elicit a big fear response. The small questions keep the fight-or-flight response in the “off” position and help us figure out how to take constructive action.

Spotlight on you!

What “BIG” question are you asking yourself these days?

How can you swap that out for a small question?

(This is big. Take a second to do that exercise!! :)

While we’re on the subject, here’s a little more mojo on it to bring the point home:

Your amygdala is essentially your panic button.

Wake it up and we trigger our fight-or-flight response.

Keep the questions small and we tiptoe past our fear by not waking up our amygdalas! :)

Small questions are good. And, so are small actions!

Maurer is all about *really* small actions.

You want to start exercising?

Awesome. Walk in place during one commercial break tonight.

Want to floss every night?

Fantastic. Start with just flossing one tooth.

Might sound silly but we *know* we can walk in place during one commercial and we *know* we can floss one tooth.

And, the exciting thing is that once you can walk in place to one commercial, you can step it up to two… then three… and something magical tends to happen where suddenly that trip to the gym or walk outside starts to sound less daunting and our behaviors change dramatically.

…

Back to you.

What’s the “Big” thing you’d like to change that just hasn’t been happening? Creating a meditation practice? Exercising? Eating better? (All of the above? :)

How can you start super small?

Maybe meditating for ONE breath every day this week? (And then two next week and then three…)

How about walking in place during the one commercial?

Or eating one bite of veggies a day or one piece of fruit?

Have some fun and get on that!! :)

Couple things here.

First, be nice to yourself!!

We need to remember to take the same tone with ourselves that we’d use for a beloved friend. (Are you? :)

Second, this is a great question: “What is one stall step I could take toward reaching my goal?”

Reminds me of Neil Fiore’s wisdom in his great book Awaken Your Strongest Self (see Notes) where he tells us: “Take a moment to think about a big project—painting the living room, losing ten pounds, learning to play an instrument, completing college—and set a reasonable deadline in weeks, months, or years from now. Write the date of the deadline on the top of a page. Then back-time from the deadline and, moving down the page, write in each week or month until you come to today. Then ask yourself, “When can I start today? On what part will I start?” After you’ve completed at least thirty minutes of uninterrupted work on the project ask yourself, “When can I start again?” You’ve just created a mental image of a project that spreads out into the future, like steps toward your goal, but also returns your mind to the present where your body can release its energy and start working.”

Love that.

“When can I start again?”

Also reminds me of David Reynolds and his *brilliant* little book, Constructive Living (see Notes), where he stresses the uber-awesome question: “Now what needs to be done?”

He tells us: “The first step in changing reality is to recognize it as it is now. There is no need to wish it were otherwise. It simply is. Pleasant or not, it is. Then comes the behavior that acts on the present reality. Behavior can change what is. We may have visions of what will be. We cannot (and need not) prevent these dreams. But the visions won’t change the future. Action—in the present— changes the future. A trip of ten thousand miles starts out with one step, not with a fantasy about travel.”

–> “What is one stall step I could take toward reaching my goal?”

–> “When can I start again?”

–> “Now what needs to be done?”

Those are good questions. :)

Mind sculpture.

Me likes!

Reminds me of Heidi Grant Halvorson’s wisdom from one of my favorite books, Succeed (see Notes), where she goes off on the science of success and tells us that it’s MUCH better to imagine yourself taking action than it is to imagine your actual desired outcome.

Powerful stuff.

Here’s how Heidi puts it: “What about “visualizing success”? I won’t name names, but it seems like there are an awful lot of self-help books out there telling people that if they just picture what they want in their minds, it will somehow happen. That would be great if it were true, but scientifically speaking, there really isn’t much evidence for it. On the other hand, visualization can be very helpful, if you imagine the steps you will take in order to succeed, rather than the success itself. Mentally simulating the process of achieving the goal, rather than the hoped-for outcome, not only results in a more optimistic outlook, but in greater planning and preparation. Picture yourself doing what it takes to succeed, and you will soon find yourself believing that you can. The best part is, you’ll be absolutely right.”

She continues: “Don’t visualize success. Instead, visualize the steps you will take in order to succeed. Just picturing yourself crossing the finish line doesn’t actually help you get there— but visualizing how you run the race (the strategies you will use, the choices you will make, the obstacles you will face) not only will give you greater confidence, but also leave you better prepared for the task ahead. And that is definitely realistic optimism.”

Time to get our mental sculpting on as we imagine taking the baby steps that will eventually lead to our success! :)

You have a journal yet?

If not, get on that. It’s *great* for capturing your dreams, articulating your values, honoring your emotions, and keeping track of all the things you’re grateful for!

Intrinsic vs. extrinsic goals.

Edward Deci is one of the world’s leading researchers on human motivation and literally wrote the book on Why We Do What We Do (see Notes).

He talks a lot about the difference between intrinsic vs. extrinsic motivation.

Here’s how he puts it: “The researchers found that if any of the three extrinsic aspirations—for money, fame, or beauty—was very high for an individual relative to the three intrinsic aspirations, the individual was also more likely to display poorer mental health. For example, having an unusually strong aspiration for material success was associated with narcissism, anxiety, depression, and poorer social functioning as rated by a trained clinical psychologist…

In contrast, strong aspirations for any of the intrinsic goals—meaningful relationships, personal growth, and community contributions—were positively associated with well-being. People who strongly desired to contribute to their community, for example, had more vitality and higher self-esteem. When people organize their behavior in terms of intrinsic strivings (relative to extrinsic strivings) they seem more content—they feel better about who they are and display more evidence of psychological health.”

That’s *really* powerful and something we want to pay VERY close attention to!

Focusing on intrinsic goals: Good.

Focusing on extrinsic goals: Not so good.

If you want to make sure you’re consistently UNHAPPY, go for the extrinsic stuff like money, fame, and wealth.

If, on the other hand, you’d like to be more consistently HAPPY, focus on the intrinsically awesome goodness such as meaningful relationships, personal growth, and community contributions.

… Where are YOU focusing your energy and how can you shift to an even deeper intrinsic focus?

That’s AMAZING.

Quick re-cap: Two groups of similar homeowners. One group is asked to put a small sign in their windows. The other is not. That’s part 1.

Part 2: The two groups are now asked to put a large, ugly BILLBOARD in their front lawns.

The group that wasn’t asked to put the small sign in their windows (aka, to take a small step) refused to display the billboard 83% of the time. (Makes sense, eh?)

The group that had already taken the small step of putting the little sign in their window, on the other hand, agreed to put the huge, unattractive billboard on their front lawns 76 (!!!) % of the time.

SEVENTY-SIX percent! FOUR times more people!!

Why?

Because they had already taken a small step.

Wacky but true.