The Best Way to Eat An Elephant

One of my favorite ideas to keep top of mind is the compound effect.  The compound effect is this idea that all the small little steps you take toward a goal add up on top of each other and multiply and before you know it you have made huge progress.  The compound effect is a book written by Darren Hardy.  It was one of the first books that I read when starting out on my personal development journey and I really LOVED it because of its simplicity.  I am going to break it down for you a little more in this blog post, but I definitely recommend picking up the book!

Life is just a series of small events that add up to be our whole BIG life!!  Right? Really think about it.  Our story is just a series of moments all strung together.

One of the things that we do as humans is set ourselves these huge goals and then think that overnight we just go from 0 to 60.  We think that overnight we can just go from eating tons of processed foods to completely clean whole foods only.  We think that we haven’t ran in 5 plus years but we can go out and do 3 miles.  But friends this is not how life works.  Sometimes we do the opposite as well where we have a goal that is so big we hide our head in the sand instead of facing it.  Or we just make it up in our head that this thing is gonna be a big deal and then it’s not.

The other day I FINALLY opened a spreadsheet that I needed to work on.  It was 1600 lines long and I was going to have to dig into each one so I was totally putting it off dreading how long it would take me to get through it.  So I opened it up and I started going through it - knowing that the only way through it was to baby step it.  I set up small chunks of time to tackle the spreadsheet and I would get through it that way.  Well, 5 minutes in I realized that most of the data was irrelevant and I was able to weed out all but 7 lines.  SEVEN LINES!!!  HAH.  I had put off this thing that I thought was going to be big and scary only for it to take me 10 minutes total.  Now, had all that data been relevant, yes I would have baby stepped it and still would have completed the project but the point of this is that we a lot of times over dramatize what something will be like in our head.  We build up fear of it and avoid it because that is easier than facing it.  Over and over again I have found that facing the problem or the project or the goal is far easier and far more rewarding than I made up in my head.

And if it is not easy, it doesn’t mean that it is not doable.  If it’s really big, like paying off hundreds of thousands of dollars worth of debt for example, you just have to take it in small steps.  Have you ever heard the saying “you eat an elephant one bite at a time”?  It just means you have this big giant thing and the way you get through it is in small bites.  The bigger question is, why are you eating an elephant?  hah - just kidding friends!

One of the examples used in the compound effect of how a seemingly small change adds up to a big difference is the idea of two planes taking off from the airport.  They each set their autopilot but they are one degree off from each other.  At first they were right with each other - passengers waving out the window at each other (okay, I made that part up!).  But after they have traveled 1,000 miles, they end up in completely different locations - just by being one degree off from each other. 

You don’t realize the effect of these small things.  Just take for example the person who wakes up everyday and drinks a healthy fab four smoothie, in comparison to the person who has a Dunkin bagel with cream cheese every morning.  These two people may have a very similar lifestyle, but just this one small choice to eat the bagel each morning can have that person gaining weight while the other maintains weight.  The compound effect is really focused on those small choices.  The people who change their life, the people who are very successful are just people who said I am going to keep taking a step in this direction every single day. I am going to keep showing up consistently day in and day out doing the same boring things over and over again.

This is how I lost 20 pounds.  I just woke up everyday and did my workout.  I made a meal plan every week and I followed it. It wasn’t a quick process but overtime the pounds started to shed and eventually added up to 20 pounds.

But as I alluded to in my bagel example - the compound effect works in both directions.  You can make small positive choices that will move you to your goals, but you can also make small choices that move you further away from the goal.  Here is an example that will help further illustrate this.  Let’s say you need to write a blog post but you keep getting distracted on social media.  The consequences of choosing social media over writing the blog post means that I will feel stressed out, I may miss my deadline, I will not be providing the value to my community that I said I would.  It might mean that the stress leads me to being sick or getting in a fight with my husband because now I can’t go on date night like I promised.  All because of a few minutes here and there of social media.  

I don’t want to make light of these small choices.  They might be small but they are not always the easy choice.  As a matter of fact they are often not the easy choice.  If you think I was really thrilled about waking up at 5am to work out everyday you are sorely mistaken.  I was NOT and as a matter of fact I started with just waking up 10 minutes earlier each day until I got to waking up at 5am fairly comfortably.  That is an example of the compound effect in and of itself.  So I understand that these choices can be difficult - but what are your other options?  What happens if you don’t make the small but harder choices to live a healthier life?

This is where you dig into your why and you just keep showing up!  For me, I do not want to suffer from diabetes or heart disease like members of my family have.  I want to live a long and fulfilling life being able to do the things that bring me joy.  I want to go hiking with my husband for many years to come.  I don’t want to be reliant on pharmaceuticals to keep me alive.  I have the power and I am choosing to use it.  So what is it for you?  What is stopping you from making the small but hard choices in life? 

I mentioned something earlier that I want to elaborate on just so you aren’t surprised.  This is not glamorous.  This is boring as crap.  This can also be a lonely journey.  It’s like putting money into your 401k - it sucks becuase you can’t touch the money for years and years.  It’s boring because you really aren’t seeing the compound effect of the interest.  And even worse you might see your money go DOWN (thanks, Biden) in your accounts.  This is not glamorous. No one is there cheering you on either.  People don’t know you are saving for your future and probably don’t care that much.  They may even think it is dumb because you could just use that money now for things you want rather than waiting until you 59.5 to see that money ever again.  But THIS is what sets you apart!! Taking these steps even when they are unpopular and lonely towards ANY goal that is meaningful to you, will put you among the elite.  You will be realizing your dreams when everyone else will be watching Netflix.  You might have some hiccups.  You might get frustrated.  You might want to quit.  But keep your eye on the prize.  Go back to your why.  Go back to the feeling you had when you started and keep putting one foot in front of the other.

Start really freaking small.  Whatever your goal is, whatever your heart is desiring, whatever you are dreaming of - picture it.  Feel it in your bones.  Imagine your life if you hit that goal.  Imagine how you feel.  And then start really freaking small.  With one doable step. Then keep taking that step forward.  After a month or two look back and see how far you have come!  And then look forward and keep going.  THIS is how you make change in your life.  BIG change.  Just one little choice at a time. You are capable. You are strong.  Now go get it!!

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