Just Commit To 15 Minutes A Day For Big Results

Small Commitments For Big Results

As a follow up to my recent post on imitating and then innovating, I wanted to share another trick I came up with for developing new skills and knowledge, as well as staying productive and consistent in any pursuit.

For anyone who has mastered a skill such as playing an instrument or writing (among many other endeavors such as developing physical strength or learning a martial art), they know that it’s always a marathon and not a sprint to achieve results.  It takes years, not weeks or months.

It’s common for people to want to get results and become great at something overnight.  But it doesn’t work that way.

It takes diligence, repetition, and commitment over the long term.  But the commitment doesn’t have to be eighteen hours a day, every day.  Consistency often goes further than Herculean efforts.

So lately when I’ve been writing, I’ve simply been committing to fifteen minutes a day.  I can always fit that in no matter what.  And it’s minimal enough that it’s a very easy commitment to stick to.

This is important because setting unrealistic goals is one of the biggest reasons people quit a pursuit.  They make a decision to bite off more than they can chew and quickly get burned out.  They aren’t patient enough to let small incremental results build up over time.

Some Days Are More Productive Than Others

The reality with creative pursuits, acquiring new knowledge, strength training, etc., is that human beings aren’t always “on”.  It’s unrealistic to expect oneself to be 100% every day.  Some days ideas and words flow, some days they don’t.  Some days a musician’s playing is effortless and flawless, some days they miss more notes than usual and feel frustrated.  Today a certain weight might feel easy to lift, while tomorrow it feels twice as heavy.  There will also naturally be some days when a person just doesn’t feel like doing anything in general.

All that said, it’s still important to remain diligent and practice/train/study regularly to stay on an upward trajectory.  At the same time it’s important to maintain enthusiasm.  So it’s not advisable to plow ahead endlessly when things aren’t clicking.

On the days when it’s evident that I’m not going to make huge strides forward, it’s still beneficial to do a little work.  And it doesn’t take very much to keep the wheels greased so to speak.

By doing at least a little bit every day, I avoid slipping into a rut where a couple of weeks pass by, I haven’t done anything, and I’m super rusty when I get back to it.

I only ever insist that I put in fifteen minutes.  I can knock that out while eating breakfast.  But if I’m feeling great, having fun, and ideas are coming to me easily, fifteen minutes can easily turn into several hours or even most of a day.  The small commitment is all that’s necessary to find out if I’m ready to put in a larger effort that day.

Even if I only put in a quarter hour I still got something done.  A little bit every day adds up.  Fifteen minutes a day becomes over ninety hours in a year.  That isn’t a huge amount of work overall, but it’s far from nothing.  And as mentioned previously it maintains overall momentum.  Add in the numerous longer and more productive days when things are going well and the time and effort really adds up.

Rome Wasn’t Built In A Day

When picking up a new pursuit, keep in mind that it takes time.  Some days will be better and more productive than others.  It’s literally impossible to become Jimi Hendrix overnight.  It takes many years.  So on days when something feels like a struggle, just do a little work and stop.  You’ll avoid frustration, be more likely to stick with it, and numerous small efforts turn into big results over time.