Non-Linear Nature of Progress

It’s like you’re going fishing.

You get all your fishing gear, get in the boat, and find yourself a spot.

You set up, put your rod in the water, and begin to fish.

‘Success’ in this case, is getting a fish. But so far, all that has happened is hard work leading up to the result.

We know that getting your gear, getting in the boat etc are things we need to do to catch the fish.

Yet when the fish finally gets stuck onto the hook and we reel it into the boat, the success of catching the fish appears to be instantaneous.

It’s the same when attempting a maths problem. At first you might not get it. Maybe after a few days you still don’t know how to approach it.

Eventually, you might have this ‘a-ha’ moment, and you will realise how to complete the problem.

So often you hear about projects that appear to have had huge breakthroughs, and it can seem like this is not going to be possible for us.

What we all need to understand is the work and thought that goes on behind the scenes to create this apparent, instant success.

Chances are, that anyone that is successful had been applying themselves in some way for many years before they reached their ‘success’.

This is also important to think about in the context of your own life.

Even though you may be plugging away, doing what seems to be meaningless tasks.

You never know how these can turn around to help you catch that fish of ‘instant success’.