Cover Photo by Jez Timms: https://unsplash.com/photos/GhfkRvlXK8c
Such a cheesy sentence: “You can succeed at everything you do.”
Feels like something our grandmas would tell us growing up.
We believed them, yet we failed. Constantly.
Were they wrong? Are we all doomed to fail? Was this all bs?
To this I say: they were right!
In fact, you are succeeding at most of the things you do, without knowing it. You’re succeeding, just not at a degree you think you were aiming for.
How I Won This Month
I gained 5kg of muscles;
I lost 2% body fat;
I got published by The Startup and became top writer in Entrepreneurship, Life Lessons and Self Improvement on Medium;
I established a partnership with another company to work on my game;
I released 3 new versions of my game;
I hired 3 new people for my video game startup;
I found a partner to work with me on a new startup idea I had;
I started a fitness group at the co-working space I work at. We grew from 2 members to 12 members in less than two weeks; and
I gave a very successful talk about productivity.
I’m certainly not saying that to brag.
Am I more skilled than you? Likely not. Some of these happened by accident. So then you think I’m luckier than you? Well, again, likely not.
Here’s what I do that makes me succeed at everything I do:
I measure everything: I quantify and qualify everything I want to win at.
That is a common pattern amongst “successful” people. In fact, that’s probably the 100th story you read about that tip.
But stick around, I’m sure you’ll find something worthwhile here!
How To Win At Weight Goals
Surprisingly, this is one of the easiest to win at, yet everyone “fails”.
In one of my latest stories: Quitting Is A Choice, You Just Chose Not To Take It, I opened up on how I didn’t quit my goal of gaining 5kg when I thought there was no way I would be able to succeed anymore. As you know from above, I did end up winning.
And here’s why I say it’s one of the easiest: You’ve got so many things you can measure when it comes to weight, whether for gains or for loss. There’s nothing subjective about weight control.
We all use a scale to weigh ourselves. When we see the same results every day, we think we fail. That’s wrong! Remember, measure everything!
Measure your body fat percentage, measure the width of each part of your body. Review weekly. Sometimes the scale will show you weigh the same, yet you did gain or lose somewhere else. I gained 1.5 inches of arm size. Same with legs and shoulders. Every day I’d measure everything. If my weight didn’t change, at least I’d see a change in one of these. I won. Everyday. 30 days in a row.
Want to lose weight? Do the same. Sometimes you’ll gain muscle mass, so the scale will show the same number, but the tape will tell you your waist is smaller, it’s just that your biceps grew stronger.
How To Win At Work
I touched a bit on that in: In Need Of Motivation? Try These Simple Tried And True Productivity Tips.
I tend to break every task down to 10–15 minutes efforts. When you work on something so big it takes a long time to accomplish, it’s easy to lose motivation and feel like we’re not accomplishing anything.
Yet every work day, I win about 32 times. All small tasks lead to a bigger goal. And by breaking it down and continually winning, I have all the motivation to accomplish the bigger goal.
That is how I managed to release 3 new versions of my game in less than a month.
How To Win At Getting People To Say Yes To You
The 3 new people I got for working on my game with me, I approached them. They all said yes. Two didn’t know me.
The company that’s partnering with my company to build the game didn’t hesitate to work with us.
The new partner I made to work on another startup I have proposed his help even before I could do it myself.
How does measuring everything help with that?
I didn’t approach random people to help me. I studied them. I researched what they do. What they like to do. Where they are currently in their career. How available they might be.
I measured how likely they might be interested in the work, my game, my team, myself. I measured how available they might be.
I approached people that ranked high in the measurements I did. This doesn’t guarantee a “yes”, but it makes it more likely than just blindly reaching out.
When you show them that you did your research, they trust you. Even if they don’t yet know you.
How To Win At Public Speaking
That was all new to me, yet the first time I did it, I nailed it. Or at least, I did very well for a first time.
How do I know? Here’s how I know. Sorry for the “boring” spreadsheet. I still encourage you to look at it. I measured my performance on 30 different points. Sometimes 5 means it’s excellent, sometimes I’m aiming for balance, so 3 is excellent.
I won on the majority of the points. But not all. There’s room for improvements. If I didn’t track all these points, I could have thought I failed or I was excellent. But now I know for sure how I did.
If you do a presentation that you think you failed, get feedback on many points, you’ll see you won on many of them. The more you practice, the more of the points you’ll win.
Conclusion
How often do you win at things you do?
How often do you fail at things you do?
Did you measure how you won or failed?
If you think hard enough, do you see some success in your failures?
If you measured everything, do you think you could win more?
I know you would.
Let my wins be your wins. Think differently. Quantify and qualify everything. Every small win is a win. Every win leads to bigger wins.
You can succeed at everything you do.
You can do this!
Thanks for reading! :)