The-Slight-Edge

52 The Slight Edge
pushes that eventually creates movement of such astonishing momentum in
their lives.
Successful people form habits that feed their
success, instead of habits that feed their failure. They
choose to have the Slight Edge working for them, not against them. They
build their own dreams, rather than spend their lives building other people’s
dreams, and they achieve these dramatic results in their lives through making
choices that are the very antithesis of drama—mundane, simple, seemingly
insignificant choices.
Every decision you make is a Slight Edge decision. What you’re going to do,
how you’re going to act, what you’re going to read, who you’re going to chat with
on the phone, what you’re going to eat for lunch, who you’re going to associate
with. How you’re going to treat your fellow workers. What you’re going to get
done today.
Simply by making those right decisions, or making more of them—one
at a time, over and over again—you will have enlisted the awesome power of
the Slight Edge on your behalf. The unwanted circumstances, the poor results
you’ve produced in the past, and the evidence of failures in your life, may all
continue for a time. There may be no light at the end of the tunnel, or at least
none you can see today. But by putting time on your side,
you’ve marshaled the forces of the Slight Edge. Your
success becomes inevitable. You just need to stay in
the process long enough to give it a chance to win.
It starts with a choice.
Cultivating Patience
Patience is a challenge for people who do not understand the Slight Edge.
Often, in the beginning, the success path can be uncomfortable, even scary.
Especially if you’re the only one around who’s on it. And with only one out of
twenty people ever achieving their goals, it’s quite likely that you will be the only
one around on the path—at least for a while.
Sometimes the path of success is inconvenient, and therefore easier not to
do. For most people, it’s easier to stay in bed. Getting on the path and staying
on the path requires faith in the process—especially at the start. That makes you
a pioneer.
Pioneers don’t know what’s out there, but out there, they go anyway. That’s
why being a pioneer takes such courage. Courage means to have a purpose and to