New Year's Micro-Resolutions: Going the Extra... Inch!

In whatever field your profession, or whatever personal hobbies you pursue, there is always room for improvement.  It does not matter how good you are now, or how well you have done in the past, there is ALWAYS an opportunity to get better…even just a LITTLE. As we move swiftly into the New Year, and our New Year’s resolutions begin to wane, remember the advice Dr. Tony Alessandra’s mother used to give her son – “always go the extra INCH!” Today we might call them micro-resolutions. If we can improve ourselves incrementally each and every day, those extra inches add up to much more than a mile! This week’s story is both a great insight into Dr. Tony’s childhood AND invaluable advice to help you get ahead in everything you do both personally and professionally.

New Year’s Micro-Resolutions: Going the Extra… Inch!

by Dr. Tony Alessandra

As we embark on yet another new year, I thought it appropriate to share with you a story from my life that might help you with any of your New Year’s resolutions…. or should I say, micro-resolutions?

I was very fortunate early in life because my mother always instilled in me the desire and the passion to constantly improve myself, but not necessarily by leaps and bounds. Over the years, I have been a self-improvement junkie always trying to be better and better in whatever it is I do. My mother had this saying that was a little unusual. She always told me to go the extra… inch. Now I know it is supposed to say the extra mile. I used to correct my mother and say… you know it is the extra mile.

She said no – a mile is too far and too hard. She told me to go the extra inch. She told me to improve myself one little inch every single day – just a little bit in every aspect of my life; whether it was physically to do an extra repetition of an exercise; whether it was mentally to read one more page of a book or to learn one more word; whether it was socially to give one more compliment to people than I did the day before; whether it was financially to learn something about making money or saving money or investing money.

I live in San Diego, California.  So naturally, I rooted for the San Diego Padres, especially when Tony Gwynn played for them.  Gwynn was a player who won the National League batting title eight times.  In 1999, he became one of less than 25 players in the history of major league baseball to accumulate 3,000 base hits in his career.  Yet, as gifted as he was, he was always the first one every day at batting practice and the last one to leave.  He videotaped every one of his at-bats, every game, and studied the videotapes every day to constantly improve.  Here was a slam-dunk member of baseball’s Hall of Fame, who constantly went the extra inch every day, every at-bat.

As I look back now, those lessons have helped mold my successes and outlook. My mom was cleverly ahead of her time. Today, the term micro-resolutions is in vogue. Decades ago, my mother just had a better way to illustrate her message to the younger me.

So, in your personal and professional life, set micro-resolutions for yourself, and go that extra inch each and every day. Look for something different, something new that you can do to improve yourself. What can you do? What can you learn? What can you achieve? Just a little bit every single day. In 2019, rather than set and hold yourself to a New Year’s Resolution, try instead to adopt regular micro-resolutions. Adopt small changes that add up to BIG improvements.

No matter how much you earn, no matter how good you already are, you can always get better…if you go the extra…inch.

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Dr. Tony Alessandra has a street-wise, college-smart perspective on business, having been raised in the housing projects of NYC to eventually realizing success as a graduate professor of marketing, internet entrepreneur, business author, and hall-of-fame keynote speaker. He earned a BBA from Notre Dame, a MBA from the Univ. of Connecticut and his PhD in marketing from Georgia State University (1976). Known as “Dr. Tony” he’s authored 30+ books and 100+ audio/video programs. He was inducted into the NSA Speakers Hall of Fame (1985) and Top Sales World’s Hall of Fame (2010). Meetings & Conventions Magazine has called him “one of America’s most electrifying speakers”.
Dr. Tony is also the Founder/CVO of Assessments 24×7. Assessments 24×7 is a global leader of online DISC assessments, delivered from easy-to-use online accounts popular with business coaches and Fortune 500 trainers around the world. Interested in learning more about these customized assessment accounts? Please contact us.