One More

I remember the first time I gave a motivational talk in a professional context. It was early in my sales career, and I had been the top performer in my office for a while. The rest of the team wasn’t doing super well, and our manager asked me to say a few words in the next day’s morning meeting.

I remember what I said then, and (unlike a lot of stuff I’ve thought/said/written in the past), I think it holds up. I talked about sales goals specifically, but this applies to any goal. I said every day, I have the same goal for the number of sales I want to make:

One more.

See, you can’t make five sales. You can make one at a time. Then you can make another, but your next goal is always that next one, that one more.

And “one” is a very manageable goal. It’s realistic. It keeps you laser-focused on the short term strategy. You’re not distracted by a larger number nor demoralized by it.

So forget about sales now. You have one problem to solve, just one. One goal to achieve. You can only solve one thing at a time, but there’s no need to distract yourself with “at a time.” Simplify it.

You have one problem to solve.

This also gives you extreme clarity about that one problem. If you only have one thing to look at, you’ll truly see it.

It also means you get to succeed, over and over again. If you tell yourself “I have ten problems,” then even if you solve nine, you’ve failed in your own mind. But if you use the “one more” dynamic, then you get constant boosts of motivation that come from accomplishment.

I’ve been writing this blog daily for over a year now. How many more posts will I make?

One more. But then ask me again tomorrow.