Tiny Changes

Lower the barrier to entry to the life you want to be living.

I’ve been obsessed lately with making tiny changes. I’m tackling problems one small incremental step at a time.

The books Atomic Habits by James Clear and Tiny Habits by BJ Fogg both cover this idea, that behavior can be changed and goals can be reached through making small, barely perceptible changes. This is not a review of either of those books, but I do want to acknowledge this concept came from somewhere…which came from somewhere…you know how it goes.

The essence of this concept is that by shrinking your goals into bite-sized pieces and making desired new habits or goals as easy as possible, you are more likely to actually achieve change over time.

So many of us are deterred because the desired goal or lifestyle feels too far away so as to seem unreachable. Instead of working to shrink the distance between where we are and where we want to be, we let where we want to be remain distant. Instead, the theory goes, shrink the goal, and do that little tiny goal right now.

As what we do each day compounds over time into a habit or a facet of our identity (e.g., I am a person who writes every day, therefore, I am a writer), introducing one tiny change each day—or every other day, every week or even every month—adds up. It makes a difference. We all know it does.

This works with things you hate doing, too: in fact, it’s helped me most with this. Whenever I dread a task I have to do, I try to make the barrier to entry as low as possible. Completing my monthly list of 30 outreach calls—my absolute least favorite part of working for a hospice—becomes just do one call a day. One call quickly builds momentum into 3 or 4, and wouldn’t you know I’m done with the whole list in a few days—all by only requiring of myself the bare minimum.

Shrinking the goal and lowering the barriers makes everything a whole lot easier; it also makes it more likely that you will continue on to reach the things you said you wanted. Maybe you don’t have an hour a day to do something you want to do, but you do have 5 minutes. What matters is following through on your intention, and letting the power of tiny changes change you, your self-perception, and your life.

You can even start with making one-time tiny changes to your life. Throw out that old appliance that doesn’t work, clean off your desk, buy some new socks. Go do all the little things you’ve been putting off. Make it easy.

What you do each day counts. Make it count in the direction you want to be going in.

Maggie