The Power of Small Progress
Explaining the concepts of small improvements and progressive overload from artists, entrepreneurs, myself, friends and family who I look up to
I have been fortified in my resolve on the power of consistency through numerous helpful books, artists, entrepreneurs, family members, colleagues, friends and my own real life experiences. This post is a tribute to the concepts of consistency, regularity, tenacity that I have picked up from these various individuals and life experiences.
A recent book that riffs on the themes of consistency and regularity is The Practice by Seth Godin. Although Godin’s book advocates these in the context of creative work, the basic message of the book is equally applicable in other contexts. Godin practices what he preaches. His blog Seth’s Blog is one of the most widely read blogs on the internet. He posts every single day. Every single day. He has more than 7000 posts and counting.
In fact, I am an enthusiastic consumer of motivational literature, self-help books, psychology books, investing books, health and fitness books and the like. I have often gleaned valuable insights about life and living from such books. And sometimes, as in the case of consistency, they have served to validate and reinforce my belief. It is not merely in self-help books that you will find songs of praise about consistency. Even serious philosophers such as Ralph Waldo Emerson and William James have, in several places, advocated its virtues.
Jerry Seinfeld, one of the most successful comedians ever, and also the co-creator of the megahit TV show Seinfeld explained to Brad Isaac his secret to becoming a great comedian. Braad Isaac, a young comedian once asked him what his secret to success was, to which Seinfeld replied:
“He said the way to be a better comic was to create better jokes and the way to create better jokes was to write every day. He told me to get a big wall calendar that has a whole year on one page and hang it on a prominent wall. The next step was to get a big red magic marker. He said for each day that I do my task of writing, I get to put a big red X over that day”
“After a few days you'll have a chain. Just keep at it and the chain will grow longer every day. You'll like seeing that chain, especially when you get a few weeks under your belt. Your only job is to not break the chain.”
Seinfeld was not banking on motivation but on consistency to fuel his creative spark.
In a popular podcast, famous music producer Rick Rubin, known to be responsible for the resurgence of various genres of music, talked about the trajectory of Chris Rock’s career as a comedian. According to Rubin, in the early years of Chris Rock’s career, the audiences hardly ever laughed at his jokes. And yet, Rock persisted. He would keep working on his jokes and turn up for gigs whenever he had the opportunity. It was his relentless consistency that has led to him becoming one of the most successful comedians.
Rick Rubin in his interview with Tim Ferris in the Tools of Titans explains his process of how he gets his artists to be unstuck in some process. He starts by giving his artists the smallest task for their song- “Tonight, I want you to write one word in this song that needs five lines, that you can’t finish. I just want one word, do you think you can come up with that by tomorrow?” The underlying tenet is to make the idea laughably small and progress.
Inspiration usually comes during work, rather than before it.
My dad follows an exercise regimen. He has a calendar set up in his room on which he ticks off each day that he does his exercise. This is a picture of a random month on the calendar this year.
Related Reading: You can read more on his transformation story in one of my other articles:
Tied in with consistency are two related concepts: “Small incremental improvement” and “Progressive Overload”. Motivational literature is filled with stories and anecdotes about both these concepts. Herewith are a few random instances of both concepts that I readily recall. This is not a systematic compilation, but things that I have either read here and there or that I have seen in my own lived experience.
Small incremental improvement:
Small incremental steps consistently and relentlessly taken can lead to massive exponential improvement.
In his book Outliers, Malcolm Gladwell describes how the Beatles tweaked and honed their skills playing long hours seven days a week for months at a stretch over a period of many years in Hamburg before they came to be the legendary rock band they are universally recognized as.
Gladwell has also highlighted the constant tinkering and incremental changes that preceded the launch of the Apple iPhone. Apple’s current market capitalization and phenomenal success is a consequence of a long period of relentless refinement by its engineers.
https://www.newyorker.com/magazine/2011/11/14/the-tweaker
Jim Collins explains a similar concept through his example of the Fly Wheel Effect in his book ‘Good to Great’
Progressive overload:
Progressive overload refers to the gradual increase in the intensity or difficulty of a task.
This is well illustrated by a story that is told about Milo of Croton, a fabled wrestler and strong man of ancient Rome who was reputed to carry a bull on his shoulders. How did he do it?
One day a newborn calf was born near Milo’s home. Milo decided to lift the small animal up and carry it on his shoulders. The next day, he returned and did the same and then then the next day and so forth. Milo continued to do this for four more years. He kept carrying the calf on his shoulders until it was no longer a calf but a fully grown bull.
I came across this story in James Clear’s outstanding book Atomic Habits.
Here is a video of James Clear smashing a heavy squat, applying the principles that he preaches in his book. James says that he arrives at the gym aiming to do 1 more rep or to raise the weight by a fractional amount. He never misses a session and eventually this process translates into something big.
This massive lift that you saw in the above video, is a culmination of multiple days of tiny lifts, it is not a flash in the pan.
This chart from his blog encapsulates the strength training philosophy, we need to find middle ground between A,B and C
Here is my own personal notebook of my squatting progression. I do not move ahead till I am able to hit at least 3 sets of 5 reps of squatting full range ass to grass (Ass to grass implies squatting all the way down to the floor). What is the hurry when I intend to be in the game for the next 30-40 years. I try to apply this principle with my work and other activities too.
The goal is just an event, something that is out of our control or that we cannot predict. But the reps are what make that event happen.
My dad thought of the nifty idea of buying 0.5 kg dumbbell plates to aid in the progression. These tiny weights make a crucial difference when a heavy weight category is reached, where the increase in reps and weights is much slower. They also keep one’s ego in check.
You can apply this principle to another activity such as long-distance running. When you first start running, you should have a modest goal in mind. And gradually, you should extend that distance a wee bit further. You cannot expect to run a full marathon the first time you step out to run. However, with incremental extensions you will get there.
The mere repetition of a behavior causes our nervous system to believe that the specific actions involved, and the context in which they are embedded are important. This could be for good or bad. Choose what you repeat wisely.
Here is a video of DDP Yoga (Yes WWE fans this is Diamond Dallas Page) The video in itself encapsulates this principle.
This video by Firaz Wahibi on the ways to workout smarter makes so much intuitive sense.
Getting into a state of flow requires doing things at an optimal level of difficulty. The task should challenge you but not overwhelm you. Nor should it be so easy that you get bored.
Below is a chart explaining this concept which I extracted from the video. The way to be consistent with an activity is to find a path in the middle of this flow channel that ensures that we want to wake up and do that activity every single day.
Training becomes addictive when you get into a flow state. It then becomes fun. Too much difficulty can tire and cause a break in the rhythm. Consistency is paramount.
I used a lot of examples from the world of weightlifting because it has taught me how to use the power of tiny incremental gains in my own life.
"What appears to be a rapid shift is often preceded by a gradual process. Our results gradually explode or vanish thanks to the small habits we repeat each day.
What radical change are you slowly marching toward? An incremental explosion or an incremental vanishing?"- James Clear
I follow a similar process for my writing habit too.
Ernest Hemingway had a great method of being consistent with his writing in that he said that he would always write at 80% intensity so as to not suffer from any kind of anxiety or burn out on arriving for the next day of writing.
Hemingway would always end a writing session only when he knew what came next in the story. Instead of exhausting every last idea and bit of energy, he would stop when the next plot point became clear. This meant that the next time he sat down to work on his story, he knew exactly where to start. He built himself a bridge to the next day, using today's energy and momentum to fuel tomorrow's writing. This is popularly referred to as the Hemingway Bridge.
I have observed that motivation for an activity is a byproduct of creating momentum- writing and weightlifting are now parts of a daily routine by simply just showing up every day even when I had no intention to do so.
“Always remember that the future comes one day at a time.” - Dean Acheson
If you enjoyed this article, I wrote another relevant article along these lines on the power of long term investing and fitness, link below:
A wonderful and motivational blog indeed