Step by Step

As a guy that has struggled with his weight his whole life, I realize how much calories can sneak up on you. In fact, in life, many things creep up on you and before you know it, you have reached a tipping point. This approach works for the positive and negative. Here are some examples I have witnessed over the years:

If you want to lose weight, it really helps to look at everything that you eat per day and then try to eliminate some unnecessary foods or make better choices. ‘Calories in versus calories out’ seems to be a good measurement. Example: If the average middle aged man cuts out 500 calories from his diet (the equivalent of two candy bars or some drinks at Dunkin or Starbucks) in 6 months, he can lose almost 25 pounds! This is everything else being equal but the theme here is that just a little difference every day can pay off big time.

Or did you know that I teach personal finance and tell 22-year olds out of college save up $1000 as quickly as possible. Then save and additional $100 per month consistently for the next 40 years and they will have about $200,000 at today’s interest rates. Save $450 per month and they will be millionaires!

When I was running companies and sales got slow, I would ask every employee to help us. If they could just refer us to their personal physician or get us one referral each, we would blow it out. If we average 500 referrals per month and we have 2000 employees and if just ¼ of them did this, we would be highly busy and successful. One by one.

When I have counseled couples going through issues, they didn’t cross the line to major problems with gambling, drugs, pornography or infidelity in one big swoop. With infidelity, it was flirting that led to talking about personal things, secrets and then all of a sudden a moment of decision. Same goes for gambling, drugs, etc. Sin seems to creep into our lives inch by inch. Then suddenly, it has you.

The message here is that success and failure is rarely achieved with one big swoop. Luck seldom has a lot to do with it. Want to be successful at most things? As with most things, there will probably be a lot of starts and stops along the way to success.

Not much different from trying to drive cross country. You plug the address into your GPS, it maps out a route and gives you an ‘ETA’. You stop for gas and potty breaks along the way and there may even be some detours or construction. But by consistently driving mile by mile for an extended period, you reach your destination.

Make a plan, work the plan, adjust the plan, start again if you fail and keep plugging ahead. Success at most things is just in front of us.

Here’s hoping the GPS doesn’t lead us to the middle of a corn field or lake along the way!

Thanks for reading this.

With a goal to “help the next guy in line”, Glen Cavallo, a 30+ year healthcare executive has chosen to share the many lessons he has learned with others. Glen does this by serving as a coach/advisor to leaders at all levels of organizations, as a board member and as he presents inspirational speeches at regional, national, annual and awards meetings