The ONE Thing: The Surprisingly Simple Truth About Extraordinary Results

by Gary Keller

Where I’d had huge success, I had narrowed my concentration to one thing, and where my success varied, my focus had too.

When you want the absolute best chance to succeed at anything you want, your approach should always be the same. Go small. “Going small” is ignoring all the things you could do and doing what you should do. It’s recognizing that not all things matter equally and finding the things that matter most. It’s a tighter way to connect what you do with what you want. It’s realizing that extraordinary results are directly determined by how narrow you can make your focus.

Sustain the discipline long enough on one habit, and not only does it become easier, but so do other things as well. It’s why those with the right

habits seem to do better than others. They’re doing the most important thing regularly and, as a result, everything else is easier.

Don’t be a disciplined person. Be a person of powerful habits and use selected discipline to develop them. Build one habit at a time. Success is sequential, not simultaneous. No one actually has the discipline to acquire more than one powerful new habit at a time. Super-successful people aren’t superhuman at all; they’ve just used selected discipline to develop a few significant habits. One at a time. Over time. Give each habit enough time. Stick with the discipline long enough for it to become routine. Habits, on average, take 66 days to form. Once a habit is solidly established, you can either build on that habit or, if appropriate, build another one.