The-Slight-Edge

176 The Slight Edge
of his life, Charles Foster Kane was consumed by a single thought: anguish over
being ripped from his childhood and thrust into the world alone at the age of eight.
The “great man” had no one to share his conquests and accomplishments with.
Earlier in this chapter, I wrote that the importance of health is “one of the
most commonly known truths of human existence—and also one of the most
commonly and blatantly ignored.” The same can be said for the importance of
relationships. How often have you heard of a successful businessperson who
achieved great financial success only at the expense of those two most precious
assets, good health and a rich family life?
When writing about the Law of Associations, I mentioned the importance
of who you associate with in terms of its strategic effect on you. But there is a
greater truth about your associations, too, because the relationships you choose
are not only a means to an end, they are also an end in themselves. All the success
in the world, as Charles Foster Kane learned, means little if there is no one to
share it with.
Relationships, too, are both built up and torn down in the subtlest ways.
Because most people are not aware of the Slight Edge, the progress of their
relationships tends to be a mystery. What makes a marriage grow richer over the
years for one couple, and grow stale, empty and bitter for another? Nine times
out of ten—or better, nineteen times out of twenty—there is no single, significant
answer. It is the little things, day by day, that add up over time to unshakable
happiness or unsalvageable misery.
You’ve no doubt heard the expression, “It’s the little things that count.” There
could scarcely be a more succinct statement of the Slight Edge—and chances are,
you’ve heard it said in the context of a relationship. The remembered birthdays,
the little gifts, the gestures, the kind words, the remembered favorite color. The
five minutes, snatched from an impossibly hectic day, to drop everything and
hear the other’s news. The word of encouragement; the reminder of your own
belief in the other person. The listening.
It’s been said that the most important statements of friendship are usually
spoken with five words or less. That is the wisdom of the Slight Edge: those tiny
thoughts and gestures that are startlingly easy to do ... and tragically easy not to do.
The future of every relationship you have, like that of your health, is a choice
that is always in your hands, and it’s no bigger than a penny. The key is to make
the choice—and keep making it.
A special category of relationships, of course, is family. If you have children,
you probably already know that they are in many ways your greatest legacy. No
matter what the state of the educational system (and regardless of the decade or