The Slight Edge

What’s the point of reading books if you take nothing from them?

The Slight Edge is a book that discusses the principle of doing little things consistently to get you to where you want to be in life. If you make the habit that you are trying to instill small enough, it’s going to be easy to do it. But the problem is that it’s even easier not to do it.

I’ve formed a small habit of filling up my water bottle at night so less brainpower goes into my morning routine. It’s super easy to do. It’s also super easy not to do and I regret it in the morning when I’m searching for my water bottle instead of simply pulling it out of the fridge.

My reading habit started with just five minutes a day. I chose five minutes because I knew after a long, exhausting day, I could force myself to do five minutes. At five minutes and thirty seconds, I’d be sleeping. Five minutes seems so meaningless, right? Only a few pages. Wrong! Five minutes was better than no minutes and most days it turned into more than five.

EVERYTHING YOU DO MATTERS. So does everything you don’t do. There is no in-between.

There is no in-between. There is no in-between. There is no in-between.

I’ll be honest. This one really hit me in regards to my marriage. If there is no in-between...I felt like we were not traveling along the up-curve. I started looking for little ways to love my husband better. I started praying for him daily guided by The Power of a Praying Wife. I feel like there is still room for improvement, but I feel like we are at least on the right curve.

Which way are you headed right now?

⬆️⬇️Your Health

⬆️⬇️Your Happiness

⬆️⬇️Your Friendships & Relationships

⬆️⬇️Your Personal Development

⬆️⬇️Your Finances

⬆️⬇️ Your Career

⬆️⬇️Your Positive Impact on The World

“There is no treading water in life, no running in place, because everything is in motion. If you’re not improving, enriching, building, unfolding - if you’re not adding assets to your personal and professional value every day - then you’re headed down the curve.”

The other concept from the book that keeps coming to mind:

DO YOU KNOW ANY GERMANS?

It is illustrated in the book with a company that is looking to expand into Germany. They don’t know how they are going to do it, but their sophisticated strategy was to simply FIND GERMANS.

How often are we overwhelmed with our larger goals? With life? With everything we want to accomplish? Instead of taking small, action steps toward those goals, we just continue to believe we’ll never get there. Or we continue to avoid it by busying ourselves with everyday life. It is SO EASY TO DO! It’s so easy to do in our “highly connected” culture. Busy is easy.

But are you moving the needle? Are you finding any Germans?

TAKE ACTION:

Sit down right now and write out one goal you hope to accomplish this year. Now brainstorm 10 small ideas that might help you get there. Take a look at that list and highlight the ONE THING that can happen RIGHT NOW. And do it.

I mean it.

Do it.

And if you’re not doing it… what’s holding you back?

If you have no idea what’s holding you back. I suggest therapy. :)

Everything you do matters.

Start small. Start with what you know and always ask yourself “Do I know any Germans?”.