Gradually, Then Suddenly

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Pre-Work:

The consistent hard work you do before seeing any results when pursuing a new goal.

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You won’t always see the impact of your effort straight away, but it will eventually come if you keep applying yourself.

Results are a lagging indicator of consistency.

Every exponential curve starts with a flat line, so you’ll never reap the rewards if you can’t stick it out when progress is unseen.

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It often takes a lot of input before you start to see any real output.

• Building muscle

• Learning to code

• Building an audience

These things happen gradually, then all at once.

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You’ve probably felt this before.

• You go to the gym and see no difference

• You take a coding course but feel stupid

• You start your newsletter that no-one reads

These things take more time than feels reasonable, and often you’ll feel like the results are never coming — but if you keep putting in that ‘pre-work’ it’ll come eventually.

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Take a look at the graph of this newsletter’s growth over time:

It’s not a straight line. In fact it’s far from it.

10 months of near radio-silence — then stuff happened.

Moral of the story: keep going.

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What are you working on at the moment? Let me know in the replies. Would be cool to see.

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