How to Make Invisible Progress

The Desert of Arizona
Hot 89 Degrees – 11:44 a.m.

Years ago, I remember Dan Kennedy (a marketing expert) explaining he had a very simple habit he developed for priming his pipeline of future business:

Each day, he would do ONE thing that would contribute to that effort. He mentioned it might be a phone call, might be a fax, might be a letter to a contact, whatever.

The importance of this habit was lost on me for years. The main reason I didn’t adopt it was because I couldn’t see the practical application for it in my life.

If I didn’t have clients and wanted clients, what exactly was I supposed to do each day to get them?

Sure I could send out direct mail, sure I could write blog posts, sure I could buy advertising. But something every day? I’d be out of ideas before the end of the week!

Without good ideas, I’d resort to doing something tiny and ineffective just to cross the “do something to get clients” item off my daily todo list.

The mental process of figuring out what I would do EVERY DAY was exhausting enough to stop before I even started.

It didn’t occur to me until very recently that I’ve adopted the very same habit in a very different form. I’ve adopted the form of the media platform; this Incomparable Expert Daily Journal email that you’re reading right now.

Each day, forward progress happens.

On most days, this progress is imperceptible. But so is watching a tree grow.

There’s really nothing to see from one day to the next. And yet, eventually, you turn around and there’s a giant tree there with an extensive root structure to provide for its life for the next hundred years.

So the choice becomes, are you going to chase dreams or are you going to live them?

If you chase dreams, that’s IMMEDIATELY satisfying. You’re chasing the dream man, just imagine when you catch it!

Or you can start living the dream. That doesn’t mean you get everything you want by tomorrow. It just means you actually commit to the journey. That’s the hardest part.

Yesterday I wrote this:

The big secret to success that I’ve discovered is that ending your search for secrets of success frees up a lot of time to actually do the work required for success.

Advisory member Matt Vestrand replied:

“Pretty much how I wasted nearly 10 years of my life…. ghaaa….. it finally dawned on me recently (I’m only 39 1/2 years old took me long enough ) I need to spend more time DOING and producing rather than seeking out tricks, tactics, an edge, etc…..

That’s why your advisory program is so awesome because it gives me the path to execution, with expert guidance, rather than a 500 page 12 DVD info product that only collects dust because I can never get through it nor figure out how to implement anything useful.”