The Tortoise was Right
Nathan Berry, founder of ConvertKit, authored three books in less than nine months. These three books transformed his entire business, earned him substantial amounts of money, and connected him to the leading players in the digital marketing world. But, how did he achieve such an extraordinary result? Did he lock himself in a cabin and write frantically for eight hours a day? In fact, quite the opposite. The way Nathan achieved such a remarkable result was by writing only 1000 words (about 2-3 pages) per day for 253 straight days. {1} Nathan’s success is radically different from the traditional conversations that surround high performance, success, and achievement. Nathan excluded burning the candle at both ends and making extraordinary sacrifices in his achievement. And, on no individual day did Nathan outwork anyone else. His daily output resulted in a high ‘average speed’. Nathan’s consistent productivity enabled him to distance himself from the rest and attain exceptional results.
Authority figures convince us that accomplishing our goals and attaining high levels of performance require extraordinary discipline, motivation, and effort. Teachers, celebrities, and business leaders all relay the same message: you must work hard to excel. However, the elusive concept of ‘hard work’ is unclearly defined. By looking at those who really progress, ‘hard work’ only drives part of their success. Instead, ‘average speed’ offers a functional, simple, and tangible framework to achieve our goals.
To perform any behavior requires a certain amount of effort. Turning on the T.V scores a 1 on the difficulty scale of 1-100 — effortless and easily repeatable. Surviving a rigorous, nausea inducing workout scores 100. This degree of effort can be performed once or twice, proving difficult to sustain. So, the sweet spot that we should aim for in our pursuit hovers somewhere in the middle, near 50. We strive to do things large enough to make a difference, yet small enough to repeat consistently. Actually performing repeatable behavior eventually increases our ‘average speed’.
Anyone can garner the motivation to visit the gym for a day and exert a singular maximal effort. This burst of ‘maximum speed’ often defines ‘hard work’. What if we averaged your exercise over the past month? Or three months? The past year? Our average speed likely plummets much lower than we expect. Rather than focus on ‘maximum speed’, pivoting towards ‘average speed’ expedites our progress towards attaining our goals.
The concept of ‘habit graduation’ can empower us to increase our average speed with time. {3} By incrementally improving our current habits, we enhance our sense of wellness and productivity. ‘Habit graduation’ refers to reaching one level higher than your usual output. If you aspire to improve your fitness level and go to the gym once per week, can you graduate to twice per week? If you want to improve your sleep, can you wind-down your days sooner and get in bed 30 minutes earlier than usual? If your work schedule is busy and you speak with old friends once every several months, can you schedule calls once per month?
By establishing goals and envisioning steps we can repeat daily, we enhance our probability of crossing remarkable finish lines. If we start with unreproducible leaps, we will fall short of our goals. Rather, steady progress yields measurable success. The tortoise proves right after all.
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