Small achievements can create confidence, build momentum and boost motivation. Here’s how to start developing your own micro wins to unlock massive success.

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I was a straight A student in school.

Even though I absolutely hated school, I still excelled.

I knew if I wanted to live out my dream of having a decent life as an adult, a quality education was going to be the foundation.

So I thrived.

Despite taking a course load of almost all Advanced Placement courses.

While taking on a part-time job in my junior and senior years to help my parents pay rent.

And spending most of my little downtime consuming illicit drugs and trying to escape from the pressure of it all.

And yet, I still crushed it.

Looking back on my formal schooling days, it’s clear that the pressure from trying to keep strong grades almost led to my undoing.

I was trying to be perfect.

When I got to college (go Noles), I was amazed by the others that didn’t overachieve like me. Must’ve been nice to have that luxury.

They’d joke that “Cs get degrees.”

In other words, stop stressing over that A+ when the bare minimum will still suffice.

Or put in more relatable terms for today’s newsletter:

Do not let perfect be the enemy of progress

That mindset shift—from striving for perfection to embracing progress—changed everything for me. And it will do the same for you.

Let me introduce you to the concept of micro wins.

You’re going to start building momentum towards your goals without feeling so wound up and rigid.

On those days when the schedule is tightening, stress is mounting, and the laundry list of action items is daunting … you’ll have a system that helps you survive the chaos.

No more feeling like a failure when you can’t achieve perfection in everything.

Just a sustainable approach to life that allows you to level up consistently.

Let’s get into it.

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Unattainable goals lead to unsustainable progress

Go big or go home.

We end up usually going home, don’t we?

I used to see it all the time when I’d coach people to get in shape.

They find that initial dose of motivation to get moving and want to capture all of that energy, so they’d set some unattainable goals. And then use unsustainable methods to try and achieve them.

Someone who hadn’t worked out in years all of the sudden was ready to train five, or even six days per week with the most intense routines and strict diets.

I get it.

We want weight loss to happen all at once because we saw that one social media post where someone supposedly lost 50 pounds in like three minutes because of a random diet or supplement.

Then we get pissed off at ourselves when we try to do the same … only to inevitably fail.

As I would tell all of my fitness students, that’s not how this works.

Most people who lose weight quickly, put it right back on even quicker than they lost it.

Go look at the horror stories of the contestants of “The Biggest Loser” and how difficult it was for many of them to keep the weight off.

I’d have to do my best to actually calm them down a bit and make things more practical.

Lofty goals are great; I encourage you to have them

It’s the reason why I was able to actualize my dream of packing up and moving to New York City in the middle of the Great Recession.

But, you still must be able to make a reasonable plan.

A plan that you can actually execute without burning yourself out.

Instead of pushing for five or six days of rigorous training, I’d have my students start on one day of strength training with lots of walking and mobility.

Rather than cut out all good groups, obsessively track calories and fast all day, we’d aim for a little bit of protein at each meal to start.

Sexy? No.

Sustainable? Yes.

Small habits that you can build into larger systems and routines that will eventually lead to incredible long-term results? Absolutely.

The key is to take the slow approach

To stop worrying about perfection and going big right out of the gate.

Focus instead on the small habits that you need to build.

Just boring, unsexy things that (when stacked up over time) lead to big results.

Micro wins.

That’s that play. That’s the whole freaking game.

Think smaller.

Think in the micro when you’re just getting started.

There’s always time to add more difficult, more layers, more things to do.

But the beginning stages are all about building the foundation by creating momentum.

Micro wins in the real world

Research from Harvard found that small daily progress—like completing one task—boosts creativity, motivation, and productivity in the workplace.

Teresa Amabile, a Harvard business school professor, conducted a study of 238 people from seven different companies to prove the benefits of stacking micro wins.

Each participant filled out a daily diary about their workday for several months.

The goal was to get a deeper look into their “inner work lives:” the participants took notes on their mood, motivation and emotional levels, and how it all affected productivity and overall quality of work.

Amabile’s team ended up collecting 12,000 diary entries with some interesting results.

But they all shared a common theme: When people took small, consistent steps forward on their big and meaningful projects, they reported being more creative, productive and engaged. And they had better in-office relationships.

Achieving micro wins led to improved work performance and overall satisfaction with their work.

“Our hunt for inner work life triggers led us to the progress principle. When we compared our research participants’ best and worst days based on their overall mood, specific emotions, and motivation levels, we found that the most common event triggering a “best day” was any progress in the work by the individual or the team.” 

— Teresa Amabile, Professor of Entrepreneurial Management at Harvard Business School

Notice this was not about completing the project and solving all of the world’s problems in one day.

It was about simply making some progress daily.

Micro wins for the win.

Let’s look at this from the power of investing

One small win per day could mean investing just one dollar.

If you started at 40 years old and invested one dollar every single day until the average retirement age of 67, you’d be investing about $9,000 total.

But the compound interest could potentially grow your dollar per day into $57,000 over time.

Not enough to retire on, for sure. And yes, that’s a bit overly simplistic. But the overall point remains that the small wins can add up.

Bringing it back home, your one dollar investment (or small win) might look like:

• a 15-minute walk when you can’t do your morning cardio
• reading a few pages instead of the entire chapter
• aiming for protein on your plate when you can’t create a full well-balanced and portioned meal

Can you commit to just 15 minutes per day to improve your position, situation, career, physical and/or mental health?

Even just 15 minutes per day will add up to over 90 total hours over the course of a full year (this is like the equivalent of investing one dollar per day).

Micro wins do add up.

How to develop your own micro wins and level up

My son was home sick recently, which meant that my work day was thrown off.

In the past, my former Straight-A perfectionist self would’ve tried to keep everything the same about my productivity and health … I’d just have to do it with my son at home, too.

As you can imagine, I’d be all wound up and anxious over trying to juggle everything:

• Write,
• manage client work,
• and create content while also hopping between calls and virtual meetings.

Oh and then I still needed to lead by example and crank out my workout.

On top of making sure my son was being cared for, too.

All of this was unsustainable.

It was the Straight-A student striving for perfection again. And I was destined to fail.

I’d get irrationally angry at myself and even my kid when I was unable to do it all perfectly because … well, my son was sick and he needed attention and care.

Hashtag face palm.

I scrapped that approach and asked myself:

What can I do today with my son home that will still move the needle forward?

Even if it was just a little bit?

In other words: What is a micro win I can earn right now?

You’re going to do the same with your own goals and habits.

First we get real clear on what we want to achieve.

Figure out what an A+ effort looks like

Remember my fellow college students preaching about “Cs get degrees?”

Yeah that was some underachiever type shit.

But in the real world there’s nothing wrong with acknowledging that your best effort is all you can give right now.

Start by setting realistic goals for how you’ll be productive this week without burning yourself out.

Use the WISE Framework to identify your biggest areas of need:

• Wellness (physical and mental health)
• Improvement (advancing your career, learning new skills, expanding your brain)
• Social connections (nurturing your existing relationships)
• Enrichment (finding time for entertainment, play and fulfillment)

Look at the week ahead to start planning this out.

Got some major projects, a pitch or a presentation that needs editing, reviewing or finalizing?

In a perfect world with no distractions or random obstacles, what would your week look like so you could get this done with high quality?

What are the steps you must take each day to wrap this work up on deadline?

When are you going to actually work on this project? Block out the time now.

This is your A+ effort.

Once you determine what an A+ grade looks like, you should then scale back into what your B and C grades look like, too.

What can you commit to doing on those days when even the minimum feels exhausting?

“On the days you only have 40% and you give 40% – you gave 100%.”

– Jim Kwik

What does a C look like?

Let’s go back to that example of my son being home. A full-on workout was not going to happen that day. Instead, I aimed for a shorter and easier to manage approach using my microworkout strategy.

Whenever I had a free moment, I’d do some kind of exercise snack: Push-ups,pull-ups, squats, jumping jacks.

Was this perfect? No.

Did it keep me active? Yes.

Was it better than doing nothing at all? Of course.

I earned a C for that day. But more importantly, I kept the momentum on my fitness going rather than just skip my workout altogether.

I earned a micro win.

My son got better and went back to school and when he did, I was able to return to my A+ routine when I had more time to train.

What does a daily micro win look like for you?

In a perfect world, you’ll have a time blocked schedule, with minimal distractions from your phone or inbox and you’ll solve all the world’s problems.

And hopefully that’s still something you can achieve on most days.

But we both know that life don’t work that way, my friend.

Give yourself the grace to be imperfect from now on. Create more flexibility and far less rigidity in your rules to success:

Earning an A in health might mean hitting your full body workout with a little cardio at the end and even a little cooldown or stretching to wrap it all up.

A B-grade might be just hitting the strength training portion of your routine.

On the busiest or lowest of motivation days, a micro win or a C-grade would be performing one set of something, or even adopting some microworkouts.

When you feel like you’re about to drown in to do list hell, keep asking yourself:

What can you do to keep the momentum going on your goals with a micro win?

Here’s how I do it in each of the four WISE categories:

• Perform microworkouts to stay active
• Read one page of your nonfiction book
• Text a loved one just to let them know that I’m thinking about them
• Catch up on a side quest in my favorite video game for 10-15 minutes

And that’s good enough for today.

Tomorrow, we will try again.

Micro wins will lead to big success

Small tiny habits done well consistently.

That’s what it all boils down to.

Your ability to identify where you want to be, then figuring out the small action steps to get you there is the key to unlocking more success than you’ve ever thought possible.

Your job is to find those small, micro wins that you can apply throughout your day.

Make that one dollar investment in yourself.

Yeah it’s gonna be really slow at first.

You might have to settle for more Cs than As some days.

Other days, you might fall off track completely.

Then you’ll question whether this is working. Or if it’s working “fast enough.”

But if you stay with it. If you stop trying to rush the process and play the long game instead, that’s when you’ll realize massive changes.

Think more like 12 months instead of 12 weeks.

You’ll notice projects and goals become easier to manage and achieve. The to-do list won’t feel so intimidating. Life will feel more balanced, purposeful, intentional.

Big results coming from small, tiny little actions.

C’s get degrees.

Be patient and consistent and put in the work and you’ll be a completely different person this time next year.

Do not wait.

Go get yourself a micro win right now.

I hope you found this useful. If so, I’d appreciate it if you sent this newsletter to one person you think would benefit from my writing today.

And as always, if you have any questions, please feel free to reach out.

I answer all of my emails at pete [at] petecataldo [.] com … Hit me up with the subject line “micro wins” and I’ll answer any questions you have to make this work for you.

Until next time,
Pete