There was once a tale,
Of a person who slowly,
Lifted the rocks from a hill,
To put them next to the sea,
He wasn’t strong, nor fast,
And everyone laughed at him,
Gradually, he lifted more of them,
Gained muscles and speed,
One day, tall waves hit,
And the barrier he formed,
Protected his home, and the village,
Slowly, everyone also lifted rocks,
Until they live far above the waves.

I used to stare at the ceiling, blaming myself for my inabilities and my weaknesses. Everyone else seems to be better than me in a lot of things.

I used to think that if I was bound to fail, why bother? I lie in panic and anxiety, sometimes plunging into a deep depression that I couldn’t get out of bed.

Those dark days still happen and I have learned to accept them as part of myself. However, there was one mindset that has helped me weather them.

Aim to get 1% better every day. Aim to make small progress every day regardless of the circumstances. Keep trying and moving forward.

#1: What does it mean to get 1% better every day?

It means to aim for small progress every day. You will still feel the frustration and anxiety that comes from feeling not good enough or failing in general.

We all have goals that we want to achieve in life but we underestimate how hard and long the journey it is to get there. When that happens, I find myself giving up a lot of times after I met with a few failures in the beginning.

Hence, I find that changing my mindset to aim for small progress every day, really helped in contextualizing the things I am doing, and to keep moving forward no matter what.

#2: Why I had to change my mindset?

Most often I fell into despair as I looked into myself and wondered why wasn’t I good enough to reach my goals or objectives. In life, we would have all experienced that no matter what. Why aren’t we better?

After failing so many times, I realized that it was not the failures or efforts that were bringing me down. It was my mindset.

Instead of looking back on the progress I have made, I lament that I have not reached where I want to be. When I reached where I wanted to be, I disregarded the efforts that it took to get there and failed to appreciate that I had come a long way.

The cycle repeats again and again.

#3: Results are Dependent on Many Things Outside of Our Control, but We Can Always Choose to Go Forward.

Sounds cliché but I want to add a bit more depth to this. Like it or not, success and failure are very much up to luck and to things not within our control.

What do I mean? In life, the outcome of a lot of things is not within our control. We think we have control but we don’t. I remember when I was doing a presentation for one of my economics topics. I spent days and nights preparing it but at the end of it, it got cancelled last minute due to scheduling conflicts.

I sent my presentation to my bosses and there wasn’t any reply as he mentioned that he didn’t need it anymore. That to me was failure. But how much of it was within my control? Not much.

Fast forward 2 weeks from there, the bosses suddenly said that they needed the materials as there was an urgent request from other organisations. To me, that was a success. Well, that is luck too.

#4: Hence, focusing on gradual improvements is more important rather than pure results.

Having a goal is good. Having a system is even better. What do I mean? Goal means there are results to be measured and achieved. A system ensures that you are well-positioned to achieve them.

And gradual improvements fit better with a system and are poor for goals. What is the difference? A goal is something like ‘To run 10km without stopping’. A system is ‘To be a better runner’.

The goal implies that if you fail to run 10km in your first week, you are failing and not achieving your objective. The system allows you to gradually work towards being a better runner and indirectly run 10km without stopping.

The psychology is different. The goal makes you feel like a failure until you achieve it, while the system provides continuous feedback on how to be better everyday.

Conclusion

If you are feeling inadequate, just remember that getting better everyday no matter how small is good enough. A lot of the results that you see are not within your control. Only the effort and the presence to keep trying is.