When Your Fresh Start Meets Real Life

We’re officially in it. The new year is here, the "word for the year" is set, the intentions are pinned to the board, and the quarterly quests are mapped out. Everything feels shiny, bright, and full of promise.

And then... the first Monday hits.

Maybe for you, it was a tech meltdown, a sudden shift in project scope, or someone else’s crisis landing squarely on your desk. For me, this week felt like everything I touched went sideways. Despite my best-laid plans, progress felt like wading through wet cement. I kept looking at my "word of the year," thinking, When is this supposed to start helping?

It’s incredibly deflating when adversity hits right after you’ve committed to a breakthrough. But this is exactly where the test lives.

Mind the Gap (and Focus on the Gain)

When things go off the rails, our brains naturally fixate on the Gap—the distance between where we are and where we planned to be. But the secret to maintaining resolve is choosing to focus on the Gain, even when that gain feels infinitesimally small (as Dan Sullivan and Dr. Benjamin Hardy describe in their book, The Gap and The Gain—I highly recommend it as a quick, impactful read).

When things go off the rails, our brains naturally fixate on the Gap—the distance between where we are and where we planned to be. But the secret to maintaining resolve is choosing to focus on the Gain, even when that gain feels infinitesimally small (as Dan Sullivan and Dr. Benjamin Hardy describe in their book, The Gap and The Gain—I highly recommend it as a quick, impactful read).

If your new routine fell apart on Monday, you don't scrap the year. You get up and try it again on Tuesday. If Tuesday doesn't work, you can try Wednesday again. You keep working on it, refining it, and—most importantly—breaking up with the old behaviors that tell you a "bad start" means a "bad year".

Introducing: The Tiny Tweak

Often, we enter January obsessed with massive overhauls. 

But massive overhauls are fragile; they break under the pressure of a chaotic Monday.

What actually builds unstoppable momentum are Quick Wins.

To help us all stay the course, I’m introducing a new recurring section to this newsletter: This Week's Tiny Tweak. These aren’t life overhauls; they are specific, implementable actions designed to help you capture a win in minutes, not months. Because when you stack enough tiny tweaks together, you create the evidence you need to prove your fears wrong.

Don't let the "gap" overshadow your progress. Let's start small and build the momentum that carries us to the breakthrough.

🤏THIS WEEK’S TINY TWEAK 

Pick one task you’ve been avoiding because it feels "too big" for this chaotic week. Commit to doing only the first 5 minutes of it.

That’s it. Don’t try to finish it. Just start the clock, do five minutes, and stop. Capture the win of breaking the seal. One small move is all it takes to shift from "stuck" back into "strategy."