Escape the Negative Feedback Loop
Stack guaranteed tiny wins until small victories compound into big ones
- Difficulty
- Easy
- Time to result
- ~weeks to results
- Steps
- 5
- Confidence
- 78%
Stapleton's method attacks the demoralisation of pre-success grind by manufacturing certainty. When someone is waking up with nothing to feel proud of, he tells them to start with the smallest guaranteed win available: gratitude for the carpet under their feet or hot water in the shower, then a self-kept promise like getting out of bed the instant the alarm sounds. Each kept promise is consciously banked as a win. Because the win is fully within the person's control, it can't fail, which rebuilds the belief that they can execute. Those tiny reliable victories stack and compound, and over time the same person who couldn't find a reason to get up is running a business. The mechanism is momentum through controllable, promise-based wins rather than waiting for external results.
Origin
Stapleton developed this working with coaching clients who struggled through the failure-heavy early phase of building companies from scratch, after his own first five to six years as an entrepreneur produced no money before a trading business took off.
Core principles
- 01Building anything new produces far more failure than success at first
- 02Everyone endures months or years of no visible results before vertical growth
- 03A win is anything you promised yourself and delivered, however small
- 04Little wins compound into big wins over time
- 05Gratitude for baseline comforts is a legitimate starting win
How to run it
- 1
Normalise the drought
Accept that building something new means months or years of digging without hitting gold, and that this is identical for everyone, not evidence you're uniquely failing.
Pro tip Remind yourself that explosive vertical growth typically arrives only after a long flat stretch.
- 2
Find one guaranteed win
Identify the smallest possible success that is entirely within your control, such as gratitude for basic comforts most of mankind lacks.
Pro tip Start with the carpet under your feet or the hot water in your shower.
- 3
Make a self-promise
Commit the night before to a concrete action, for example getting out of bed the moment the alarm goes off.
Watch out Choose something you cannot fail if you simply follow through; a stretch goal defeats the purpose here.
- 4
Keep it and bank it
Execute the promise the instant the trigger fires, then consciously register the win ('boom, I'm winning').
Pro tip Naming the win out loud reinforces the identity that you keep promises to yourself.
- 5
Stack the next win
Once one win is automatic, add the next slightly harder controllable action, letting the sequence compound.
Pro tip If you can do the first thing, you can do the next thing; chain them.
In the wild
A client with no recent successes wakes each morning asking what they have to be proud of. Stapleton tells them to stop searching for a big reason and instead promise, the night before, to get out of bed the instant the alarm sounds. When it fires, they get up, and consciously mark it: 'I'm winning, because I promised myself I'd get up and I did.' That single reliable win becomes the seed for the next, and over weeks the accumulated small victories reshape how the person thinks and acts.
→ The client rebuilds self-trust and momentum from a zero-cost, unfailable daily action.
Common mistakes
Waiting for a big result to feel good
Tying your sense of progress to external outcomes that lag by months guarantees you quit before they arrive.
Picking a first win you can fail
If the starter win isn't fully within your control, a miss reinforces the very failure loop you're trying to escape.
Is it for you?
Best for
Founders and creators grinding through the long, result-free early phase of a new venture.
Not ideal for
People whose problem is strategy or skill rather than motivation and momentum.
From the transcript
“if you need a success for the day get up when your alarm goes off because there's a ton of people who can't even do…”
“over time those little wins turn into big wins and it is it really it is life changing these little tiny tweaks”
From the episode
How To Survive The 21st Century - Jason Stapleton - #148
Jason Stapleton