Small Wins That Quiet Doubt and Compound
Created at: August 29, 2025
Collect small victories; they will outnumber doubt — Haruki Murakami
Why Tiny Wins Matter
Murakami’s line suggests a tactical shift: instead of wrestling doubt head-on, amass evidence against it. Each small victory—an email sent, a page drafted, a workout completed—functions like a tally mark in your favor. Over time, these marks form a ledger that reality and memory can reference, weakening the inner critic’s case. Crucially, this is not mere optimism; it is an evidence-gathering strategy. By shrinking the field of play to actions you can complete today, you replace abstract fear with concrete progress. As these increments accumulate, the ratio of wins to worries changes, and with it, your sense of agency.
The Progress Principle in Psychology
Building on that, organizational research underscores the same mechanism. Teresa Amabile and Steven Kramer’s The Progress Principle (2011) showed that making even small progress on meaningful work strongly boosts motivation and mood. In their diary studies, tiny steps moved morale more reliably than perks or pressure. Earlier, Karl Weick’s Small Wins (American Psychologist, 1984) argued that reframing big problems into bite-size solvable pieces converts paralysis into traction. Together, these findings explain why small victories don’t just feel good; they create a feedback loop that sustains effort, thereby steadily crowding out doubt.
Habits and the Math of Compounding
Moreover, habits translate small wins into an automatic engine of progress. James Clear’s Atomic Habits (2018) popularized the idea that modest, repeated improvements compound—like interest—into outsized results. Similarly, BJ Fogg’s Tiny Habits (2019) shows how ultra-small actions, tied to existing routines, generate reliable momentum. Under the hood, each completed action is a reinforcement signal; success triggers a small reward response, making the next repetition easier. Implementation intentions—if-then plans studied by Peter Gollwitzer (1999)—further reduce friction, turning intentions into cues for action. The net effect is steady accrual: many modest gains, multiplied over time.
Murakami’s Marathon Method
In practice, Murakami models the ethos he describes. In What I Talk About When I Talk About Running (2007), he recalls rising early to write for several hours, then training—often running 10 km—day after day. The routine is intentionally repetitive, because repetition converts effort into rhythm and rhythm into endurance. This approach mirrors long-distance running itself: you don’t defeat the miles; you keep collecting them. Pages and kilometers alike become small, countable successes. And as they accumulate, doubt has fewer places to stand; consistency makes belief feel less like faith and more like a record.
Kaizen: Continuous Improvement, Personalized
From art and sport, we can pivot to operations. Kaizen—popularized by Masaaki Imai’s Kaizen (1986) and embodied in the Toyota Production System—champions continuous, incremental improvement. Rather than waiting for a sweeping overhaul, teams seek many tiny fixes that remove friction, elevate quality, and compound into advantage. Applied personally, kaizen means lowering the barrier to action: trim a step from your morning routine, pre-stage tools, or shorten feedback loops. Each improvement is small, but the accumulation changes throughput and confidence. As waste recedes, doubt loses one of its main allies: messy, demoralizing workflows.
Turning Doubt Into Data
Finally, make progress visible. Amabile and Kramer recommend keeping a brief progress journal to capture daily wins; a simple done list archives proof that momentum is real. Paired with weekly reviews, this record turns vague self-doubt into inspectable data. When setbacks occur, scale the next action down and use an if-then plan to reengage. Celebrate closure with a tiny ritual—a check mark, a note to self—so the brain tags the moment as success. Over weeks, these tracers show an unmistakable trend: small victories piling up until, by sheer count, they outnumber doubt.