Inch By Inch, Success Is A Clinch: But By The Yard Success Is Hard
If I were to ask you to eat an entire African Elephant, do you think you could do this? Well despite African Elephants being able to grow up to 3 metres tall, the answer is yes you can. And the way in which you can do this is simply by taking one bite at a time! Yes it may take a long time but by taking one bite at a time, you could eat an elephant over a certain amount of time.
Now I am not writing this Medium article on how to eat elephants; as a vegetarian that would be most out of character for me. Instead I would like to discuss the meaning behind this adage; this being that by taking a series of small steps (or bites) in the right direction, you can accomplish huge goals (such as eating an elephant)!
I should mention that unlike my other Medium articles which are mainly speculative around current events, this one however is based on physical and experiential evidence. For one cannot really deny that it is the small things in life that make up the big things. And likewise one cannot deny how big results are produced by a series of small actions.
Like most people, whilst you may well be aware of this principle in theory, you probably haven't really much more about it. And you probably haven't realised how this principle can also greatly enhance your life!
Reach For The Stars
Everyone of us dreams; and I aren’t just referring to the type you have when asleep. Essentially these ‘Waking Dreams’ are a positive thing for at the very least, they can provide us with momentary pleasure. Yet they can also inspire us towards achieving some huge goal which could potentially change the world.
Unfortunately, if you don’t have a way or strategy in which to realise these dreams, than they will remain nothing more but brief glimpses in the mind, permanently taunting you on something with which you have no idea how to achieve. Worse still is the fact that dreaming too much about something but not taking any action can cause others to look upon you as just a ‘dreamer’ and so not somebody to be taken seriously! When was the last time you seriously took the advice from somebody who spends all their day daydreaming?
If however you were to apply the principle of taking small consistent steps as a strategy towards attaining your dreams, you’d instantly increase the likelihood that you will materialise your dreams into reality (or at the very least took a damn good shot at it)! Yet how does one apply the strategy of small steps towards attaining a dream.
Well the following steps if implemented correctly will provide you with the greatest chances of success (and to think most self-help gurus would charge you a fortune just to learn this strategy):
STEP ONE
Take a few minutes to sit down with a pen and paper (or word doc if you prefer) and try and crystallise your dreams. Spend as little or as long as you want on this task, knowing you can come back to do some more, etc, until this step is completed. This step is vital as nearly all our dreams tend to be wishy-washy, hence you’d need to crystallise them into reality.
EXAMPLE — ‘I wish to work with dogs’ is a dream, whilst ‘I want to volunteer at a dog sanctuary two days a week’ is a crystallised goal
STEP TWO
Once you have figured out what your dream means if materialised into reality, (aka a Goal) the next step is to ask yourself what can you do to start bringing this goal into reality. This can be said to be the hard part for it will determine how long it will take to achieve your goal; and if it is even achievable with the resources, etc you have.
EXAMPLE — ‘I want to write a book’ is more easily achievable than ‘I want to construct the world’s first time machine.’
STEP THREE
Once you figured out how you are going to achieve your big ‘dream-converted-into-goal,’ the next step is to work out what small step you can start bringing your goal into reality. By a small step, make sure that it is small enough that you know without a doubt that you can achieve it.
EXAMPLE — In the ‘write a book’ goal, this could be something like ‘sit down and come up with something I’d like to write about’ and for the ‘construct a time machine’ goal, it could be to look at a few current theories put out there on time travel!
STEP FOUR
Once you have completed step three, the next stage is to decide upon your next small step. Obviously the more out-there your goal (like constructing a time machine) the less likely you are going to know from the outset all the steps you’d need to take. But as long as you know the next few steps you’d need to take, in theory you’d soon make strides towards your goal.
STEP FIVE
Repeat step four again, and then again, taking feedback from your previous small step and re-correcting yourself if you happen to not be heading in the right direction. I’m sure if you dedicated your life to something as complicated as say constructing a time machine, you would probably go down several wrong directions, and have to go back several times, before you get it right. And if you don’t manage to complete your research during your lifetime, your grandchildren can come back and show you where you went wrong!
STEP SIX
After taking a large amount of small steps, you will hopefully achieve your goal and as such, materialise your dream.
There you go. The above strategy is the secret to achieving your most wildest dreams; or at the very least give you the best chances.
The secret however behind this strategy is to take a series of small steps; one at a time. For if your dream is too big and you focus on all the things that you’d need to do at once, you’d only end up overwhelming yourself. So focus on one small step at a time; remembering to take feedback on where you are, as well as rewarding yourself regularly for the action that you have already taken.
By applying small steps to your life, you will greatly increase the likelihood of achieving great things within your life. Or at the very least, be able to complete boring tasks with greater ease.
PS — If you would like to see the process of small steps in action leading to large results, recommend you watch the following TED Talk by Stephen Duneier, Hedge Fund Manager and a World Record Breaker.
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