The One Habit that Changed Me For Good and Accelerated Towards Success
Showing up, no matter what.
When it dawned on me that success is not one grand event or deed, but rather a long journey where each of the steps count, I started many small daily disciplines in different areas of my life. In other words, I started to show up every day.
Whenever I wanted to achieve something, I translated the goal into a small daily activity.
My Small Disciplines
I wanted to deepen my spiritual life, so each day I studied the Bible for 10 minutes and read a book written by a saint for 10 minutes a day.
I wanted to get control over my finances, so I started to track my every expense.
I wanted to become a better database administrator, so I started to study professional documentation for 10 minutes a day.
I decided to become a writer, so I started writing every single day.
Success
I discovered relatively quickly that I am on the right path to success. After a month of practicing speed reading for 10 minutes a day, my reading speed increased by almost 100%. That made me excited like a teenager in a boy band concert. I love to read! Suddenly, I was able to read twice as much as before in the same amount of time.
So I stuck with my daily disciplines in other areas. In a few months, I reached my dream weight.
In the next few years, I beat over 200 personal fitness records.
A few months after writing regularly, I started writing my first book. I wrote and published it within 49 days.
I passed a few professional exams and obtained a couple of database administration certificates.
Show Up = Success
And then real successes came. I bought our first house, because I earned just enough from book royalties to contribute to the mortgage. In the two years prior, I had also increased my saving ratio from 3–4% to about 20%.
I wrote and published 15 books. I sold well over 32,000 copies of them.
I started an online coaching practice and coached over 100 people.
I networked, so now a few millionaires know who Michal Stawicki is. One even wrote a foreword for my book.
My answers on Quora got over 3.5 MILLION views. I have thousands of subscribers and followers on social media.
I became so knowledgeable about book ads on Amazon that, last year, I started advertising books for other authors. In 8 months, I scaled this business to 14 authors, 40+books and 4 figures a month.
My wife quit her job, and I downsized my corporate job to half-time. The idea is to get rid of it completely down the road.
But I never did something spectacular. I showed up. I wrote every day. I read and commented on blogs. I published Quora answers. I ran my ad campaigns, and I learned a few tactics that work on Amazon.
My biggest daily discipline was about 1-hour long (writing). Everything else was smaller.
Show up. Consistency is more important than results, because consistency generates results.
Originally published at www.quora.com.
