Attending Denison was one of the best decisions of my life. I earned a spot on the
baseball team and, although I was at the bottom of the roster as a freshman, I was
thrilled. Despite the chaos of my high school years, I had managed to become a college
athlete. I wasn’t going to be starting on the baseball team anytime soon, so I focused on
getting my life in order. While my peers stayed up late and played video games, I built
good sleep habits and went to bed early each night. In the messy world of a college dorm,
I made a point to keep my room neat and tidy. These improvements were minor, but they
gave me a sense of control over my life. I started to feel confident again. And this
growing belief in myself rippled into the classroom as I improved my study habits and
managed to earnstraight A’s during my first year. A habit is a routine or behavior that
is performed regularly—and, in many cases, automatically. As each semester passed, I
accumulated small but consistent habits that ultimately led to results that were
unimaginable to me when I started. For example, for the first time in my life, I made it a
habit to lift weights multiple times per week, and in the years that followed, my
six-foot-four-inch frame bulked up from a featherweight 170 to a lean 200 pounds. When
my sophomore season arrived, I earned a starting role on the pitching staff. By my junior
year, I was voted team captain and at the end of the season, I was selected for the
all-conference team. But it was not until my senior season that my sleep habits, study
habits, and strength-training habits really began to pay off. Six years after I had been
hit in the face with a baseball bat, flown to the hospital, and placed into a coma, I was
selected as the top male athlete at Denison University and named to the ESPN Academic
All-America Team—an honor given to just thirty-three players across the country. By the
time I graduated, I was listed in the school record books in eight different categories.
That same year, I was awarded the university’s highest academic honor, the President’s
Medal. I hope you’ll forgive me if this sounds boastful. To be honest, there was nothing
legendary or historic about my athletic career. I never ended up playing professionally.
However, looking back on those years, I believe I accomplished something just as rare: I
fulfilled my potential. And I believe the concepts in this book can help you fulfill your
potential as well. We all face challenges in life. This injury was one of mine, and the
experience taught me a critical lesson: changes that seem small and unimportant at
first will compound into remarkable results if you’re willing to stick with them for
years. We all deal with setbacks but in the long run, the quality of our lives often
depends on the quality of our habits. With the same habits, you’ll end up with the same
results. But with better habits, anything is possible.Maybe there are people who can
achieve incredible success overnight. I don’t know any of them, and I’m certainly not
one of them. There wasn’t one defining moment on my journey from medically induced
coma to Academic All-American; there were many. It was a gradual evolution, a long
series of small wins and tiny breakthroughs. The only way I made progress—the only
choice I had—was to start small. And I employed this same strategy a few years later
when I started my own business and began working on this book.