Baby Steps

Baby Steps (n.) - Baby Steps are the smallest movement you can take to move forward toward a goal. Often when a goal is selected, it can be difficult to stick with it because the interim steps set to achieve the goal are too large. If the goal is really wanted but no movement is occurring, the steps to get there need to be broken down more and more to become smaller and smaller -- and, thus, more achievable.

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Baby steps are the absolute bare minimum effort possible to move forward

People often think baby steps are too small and are hesitant to move their interim steps down to the bare minimum. People would rather have a larger step that they won't do over a smaller step that is much more easily achieved. However, moving only one inch every day will get you much farther in the long run than moving five feet in one day and then stopping indefinitely.

You can always do more each day if you want but it's important to have the default step be small enough that it can be easily done each time. Think of a baby step as the base level commitment. Do the minimum first and, if you can keep going, keep going. But at least do the minimum each time. There is a reason the tortoise and hare story has been around as long as it has. It's a very basic wisdom.
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Example: Bob set a goal to write one page of his movie script each day. He did it a few days and stopped. He then switched his goal to be more baby step-based and now only has a goal to write one line of dialogue every day. Each day he puts down one line.  Some days he does more but every day he puts down at least one line as the minimum. The result is he now has six pages done when, with his old method, he would still have only two pages while he waited to have a longer stretch of inspiration again.

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