How small 1% habits, stacked together, compounded over time can produce enormous results.

In 1979, a plane carrying over 250 people departed New Zealand for a sight-seeing flight to Antarctica and back.

Shortly after takeoff and unknown to the pilots, there was a minor 2-degree error in the flight coordinates.

While easily adjustable, the compound effect of starting off course placed the aircraft 45 kilometers (or 28 miles) off from where the pilots thought they were.

As they arrived at their destination, the pilots began their descent to give the passengers the promised view of the eerily beautiful frozen desert.

But the inaccurate coordinates had placed them on a crash course towards Mount Erebus, an active volcano that rises to a height of more than 3,700m (12,000 feet).

The plane crashed into the side of the volcano, sadly killing everyone on board.

This tragedy was created by a small error — a matter of only a few degrees compounded over time.

What does this story mean for you?

Answer: The direction of your life is the result of your 1% decisions.

Those small, daily, seemingly inconsequential choices you make in your 20s will set you on a trajectory that could make or break your life.

While big leaps and massive action sound sexy, life is a game of inches. Winning at anything is the accumulation of slow, incremental progress made over a long period of time.

As Stephen Covey once said, “if the ladder is not leaning against the right wall, every step we take just gets us to the wrong place faster.”

While I am not saying your life will end in a tragic accident, your decisions accumulate over time and compound to either move you toward your ideal life or away from it.

The tragic realization is that people can get into their 40s and 50s and wonder how they even got themselves into this situation.

The gradual compromise of their goals results in working a job they hate, being trapped in an unfulfilling marriage and being surrounded by people they dislike.

The good news is that if you’re in your 20s or even your 30s, you can change your life trajectory simply by making better daily decisions. Even if you feel like you’ve wasted too much time.

“You should be far more concerned with your current trajectory than with your current results,” writes James Clear.

Here are the 8 habits to get you on the right trajectory.

#1: Learn The Dark Magic of Mind Control

Your reality is created by what happens between your ears.

If your mind is not primed for growth, you can forget about achieving any sort of success. A fixed mindset will only create linear results. A growth mindset will create exponential results.

A pessimistic or negative thought pattern has killed more dreams than a lack of talent ever will.

Through neuroplasticity, you can change the composition of your mind through daily repetition. Just like you are what you eat, your mind is what you repeatedly think.

Cultivating a mindfulness practice consisting of daily writing, journaling, and meditation in your early 20s will permanently change your brain for the better.

#2: You’re Comfortable Being Alone, But You’re Not Lonely.

“When you’re alone, you have time to know who you are. When you’re always with others, you’re just a product of the other people in your life.” — Darius Foroux

Time in solitude builds a strong mind.

I see too many people jump into mediocre relationships because they are afraid of being alone. They fear their insecurities and haven’t done the work to be comfortable alone.

But a weak mind only attracts other weak minds. As David Schwartz writes, “people see in us what we see in ourselves so we attract the treatment we think we deserve.”

I am no relationship expert, but I believe this is why the divorce rate is so high. Most people aren’t capable of loving themselves fully, so how do you expect to give love to someone else?

I’m lucky to be surrounded by friends and family that I love but I frequently take trips overseas by myself. I take myself out to the movies and eat meals alone without looking at my phone.

Time in solitude helps you build a strong relationship with yourself. And the best relationships are those built on mutual love, not dependence or hoping that this person will fix you.

#3: Taking Responsibility For Your Self-Education

“Formal education will make you a living; self-education will make you a fortune.” — Jim Rohn

The moment you stop learning is the moment you’re dead.

There was a period of my life when I stopped reading, writing or taking any sort of online courses. And guess what? I stagnated for over 6 months.

I felt sluggish. I had no new ideas or original thoughts. My excitement for my life diminished. I felt like I was dying a slow death.

It took going through a painful breakup in 2017 to get me back on the self-development journey. I’ve never looked back since.

I will regularly cancel plans or not go out in order to read books, take online courses or give myself time to think. This might sound extreme, but learning makes me a better friend, brother and family member.

If you’re not actively developing yourself to be better, you’re passively making yourself worse over time.

#4: Distancing Yourself From Losers

“Be willing to let go of friendships that don’t serve you.

Just as crabs outgrow their shells,

You must shed your past to expand into your future”

— (Source)

Show me the people you hang around and I’ll show you your future.

Most people are doing their best with what they’ve got. But many aren’t. Some have toxic traits they aren’t even aware of or unresolved trauma they project onto you.

You can empathize with their experiences, but it's not your job to fix them. If they aren’t willing to do the hard internal work, it's time to move on.

As Maya Angelou once said, “when people show you who they are the first time believe them. Not the 29th time.”

#5: Copy Success From Those Around and Above You

In your 20s, you don’t know much.

You may think you’ve got everything figured out but there are people who have been working longer than you have been alive.

Put your ego aside and learn from them. You can either sh*t on someone else success or learn from what they have discovered. The choice is yours.

You need to be able to replicate before you can iterate. All the best artists start off as derivatives of their heroes. Over time, they started to find their own voice and style that was unique to them.

Yohji Yamamoto, a fashion designer, once said, “start copying what you love. Copy copy copy copy. At the end of the copy, you will find yourself.”

#6: Taking High-Value, Low-Downside Risks

If you find yourself with no kids, no mortgage, and few liabilities, you’re in the best position to move quickly and take risks.

Some high-value, low-downside risks you can take in your 20s:

• Building a business or side hustle (i.e building an audience online)

• Making investments in yourself (i.e taking online courses or coaching)

• Taking weird opportunities that build life experiences (i.e travel)

These risks have limited downside, but unbounded upside.

The only thing you can lose is a bit of money and time. But this ‘loss’ is offset by the experience and growth you get in return.

Don’t optimize your ‘career’ for money in your 20s. That will come with time. Focus on developing your skill stack, collecting diverse experiences, and building a solid network and community.

Explore widely in your 20s so that you can exploit narrowly in your 30s.

#7: Your health is the foundation of everything you do in life.

“A healthy man wants a thousand things, a sick man only wants one”

— Naval Ravikant

For most twentysomethings, you’ll naturally be blessed with a higher baseline of health. This is the best time to create habits that will ensure that you stay healthy.

Maintenance is far easier than transformation. As Benjamin Franklin once said, “an ounce of prevention is worth a pound of cure.”

You don’t need to be the next Chris Hemsworth or workout every day, but you can lay the foundations of your health by:

• Understanding what eating patterns and healthy foods you enjoy.

• Finding a sport or exercise you find fun and gets you moving.

• Protecting your skin.

• Surround yourself with trusted health professionals.

Remember that the best health and wellness strategy is the one you can consistently stick to. Don’t worry about passing fads or trying to attain a perfect body.

#8: Regularly experiencing voluntary hardship can help reset your mind.

You can break the monotony of routine, give yourself a better perspective on life and create motivation to attain even harder things.

The beauty of doing hard things is that it creates momentum. You get a ‘winners high’ effect, where completing one hard task sets you up psychologically to achieve something even harder.

It’s why I tend to start my mornings off with a combination of meditation, exercise, reading and a cold shower.

Do I feel like doing these things every day? God no. I hate freezing my naked ass off in the morning.

But doing these hard things primes my mind to tackle hard challenges later.

When I’ve experienced the most uncomfortable thing in the morning, there is really nothing else that could shake me.

Hard choices, easy life. Easy choices, hard life.

Bringing it all together

If you can nail the foundations in your 20s, you’re setting yourself up for enormous success in your 30s and 40s.

Small habits, stacked together, compounded over time produce enormous results.

Start by deciding to make a change today.

Don’t be defined by what you didn’t know or didn’t do in the past.

You can start deciding the direction of your life right now.

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