It Doesn’t Take Much…

Big Outcomes Don’t Require As Much Effort As You Think

Updated: September 7th, 2023

When you think about achieving a big outcome such as growing a $15M company, reaching financial independence, retiring early, writing a book, or getting in shape – you can’t help but think “this is going to take a lot of work.”

You might even think that to reach your desired goal, you’ll need to put everything else aside.

And so you may not ever bother to start.

Well, I am here to tell you that it doesn’t take much as effort as you think!

Big outcomes are NOT the result of one big action.

Big outcomes ARE the result of thousands of tiny decisions and thousands of tiny moments that eventually compound into something so big that they can’t stop themselves.

Big outcomes don’t need a big action. Big outcomes can start with simple things:

Waking up 30 minutes earlier every day
Or staying up 30 minutes later every night
Committing to learning ONE new thing every day
20 minutes of exercise a day
Taking an hour a week to execute on your goals

Tiny habits and small changes are all that is needed to get going.

Building Your Personal Flywheel

So how can a tiny new habit or a small change help you to achieve the big outcome you are looking for?

It creates momentum.

A journey of a thousand miles begins with a single step.
– Confucius

Once you begin to build momentum, whether it is in business, personal finance, fitness, or really anything else, you begin to unlock an unstoppable force.

The Flywheel Effect as formulated in Jim Collins’ Good to Great does a great job of explaining how momentum REALLY works.

The idea is that at first, moving your massive, heavy flywheel (your goal) is a challenge.

It takes time and effort to get it moving.

But after many slow and methodic rotations through your flywheel, it begins to move.

And then it moves a bit more…

Then, at some point—breakthrough! The momentum of the thing kicks in your favor, hurling the flywheel forward, turn after turn … whoosh! … its own heavy weight working for you. You’re pushing no harder than during the first rotation, but the flywheel goes faster and faster.

Each turn of the flywheel builds upon work done earlier, compounding your investment of effort. A thousand times faster, then ten thousand, then a hundred thousand. The huge heavy disk flies forward, with almost unstoppable momentum.

Now suppose someone came along and asked, “What was the one big push that caused this thing to go so fast?”

You wouldn’t be able to answer; it’s just a nonsensical question. Was it the first push? The second? The fifth? The hundredth? No! It was all of them added together in an overall accumulation of effort applied in a consistent direction. Some pushes may have been bigger than others, but any single heave—no matter how large—reflects a small fraction of the entire cumulative effect upon the flywheel.
– Jim Collins, Good to Great

Once you begin to enact small changes day after day, you start to build momentum for your flywheel.

Once you have momentum, your business, fitness, or financials take care of themselves. You don’t need to do too much.

Even when you start small, so long as you stick to it, you will eventually win big.

Building Daily Habits

Success is the product of daily habits-not once-in-a-lifetime transformations.
– James Clear, Atomic Habits

In my Atomic Habits review I outline what James Clear expertly put together to help anyone serious about building great habits.

Ultimately, creating great habits comes down to being very specific AND clear, about what exactly you will do, where you will do it, and when you will do it.

“I will [BEHAVIOR] at [TIME] in [LOCATION].

Meditation. I will meditate for one minute at 7 a.m. in my kitchen.
Exercise: I will exercise for one hour at 5 p.m. in my local gym. “

So if your goal is to become financially independent, your best bet is to outline exactly what you can easily do to get there:

I will automatically send $2,000 a month, directly from my paycheck into my investment account.
I will max out my 401(k) every year, via automatic deductions from my paycheck.
I will update my Net Worth in an excel spreadsheet, on the 1st of every month.

Becoming financially independent at first seems like a huge, HUGE, task.

But broken down into a few small steps, you can see that it actually doesn’t take much.

Now, let’s look at writing a book:

I will set my alarm for 6 am every day.
I will sit at my computer, in the office, without distractions.
I will write for 1 hour. I will write. Nothing more.

If you did that every day for a year. I would be willing to bet that you’d have a book on your hands!

Most people overestimate what they can do in a day, and underestimate what they can do in a year.
– Bill Gates