The Bad Days

I used to have a very shortsighted view of what it took to achieve great things, in that I thought you could have a “perfect” run at them: step 1, step 2, step 3, and boom, it’s done. But as I grow up I now realize that life is going to be volatile no matter what. You could pull off a string of perfect days, but eventually something will break down, and you’ll have a less-than-perfect day. Dare I say even a bad day. The question isn’t whether you’ll have a bad day, because it seems like in any journey worth pursuing, you will most definitely have one. The question is, rather, how bad are your bad days?

One thing I’ve been trying to establish is a “minimal viable day”. This is a term I just made up, but to me the concept resembles that of a “minimum viable product” (MVP) which is common in the startup world. When you’re trying to build a new startup, there are many possible bells and whistles you can tack on to your product; some will succeed and some will fail, but you can’t tell which is which ahead of time. Still, you need a bare minimum to sell to users and pitch to investors so that you can maintain some level of traction, and this is the MVP you can always fall back on. Similarly, in your everyday life there may be some days you feel tired, sick, or not as mentally sharp as usual. Still, can you execute at some level? Even the greatest competitors have good and bad days, so the difference can’t just be that successful people are immune to variance. The difference instead lies in the baseline: showing up, putting in the reps, and making meaningful progress even on the worst days. I think this on its own might even be enough to differentiate those who win vs. those who don’t. The bad days will come regardless, but if you can still turn each one into a small win rather than conceding entirely, that progress will compound and the big wins will inevitably follow.