Regardless of the location and that Dyrsmid was a beginner with no hopes raised, he made remarkable progress thanks to a simple daily habit.
Paper Clip Strategy
Dyrsmid would start every morning with two boxes on his desk, one full of paper clips and the other empty. Then, he would make sales calls. He would move a paper clip to the empty box every time he finished a phone call. With each call he made, Dyrsmid moved 120 clips one by one from the full box to the empty one. That was the mission: 120 daily phone calls and a paper clip with each call.
Within eighteen months, Dyrsmid had earned $5 million for his bank. By the age of twenty-four, he was making $75,000 a year, which is equivalent to $125,000 today. Not long after, he worked for another company with a bigger salary.
Useful Habits Remain, While Bad Ones Quickly Fade
When Dyrsmid was asked about his habit, he said, “I would start calling at 8 a.m. every day. I never looked at stock quotes or analyst research. I also never read the newspaper for the entire time. If the news was important, it would find me in other ways.”
Dyrsmid's experience is a piece of great evidence that success results from commitment and following certain principles and habits over time.
Compare your situation to what Trent has achieved and accomplished. We always want to commit to our work, but our commitment to wasting time is greater. You should write more gratitude notes, eat healthy food, and keep reading books. However, you might not have the motivation to do all this. You really want to achieve your goals, but you always procrastinate.
What is the difference? Why do some habits fail while others succeed? Why did Trent's method work? What can we learn from his experience?
The Power of Visual Cues
The paper clip strategy works because it is a visual stimulus that encourages you to make the experience a habit. Many people have applied it. A woman used to move a hairpin from one box to another every time she finished writing a page in her book—a man used to move a weight from one place to another after each set of push-ups.
Making progress is satisfying. Visual measures, like moving paper clips, hairpins, and weights, are your greatest witness to your success. It enhances your behaviour and actions and satisfies you with every activity you perform.
Here are some examples of the importance of visual cues in building meaningful habits:
Visual stimulation motivates you to change your behaviour to achieve your goals. We often deceive ourselves into thinking that we cannot acquire new habits. A few days later, all our motivations disappear, and we return to life issues. Therefore, a visual stimulus, such as a box full of paper clips, is very useful. The right environment makes it easier for you to reinforce these beneficial habits.
Visual cues display your success in the form of actions that you persevere with. It is no secret that persistence is the basis for success, but very few people realize how consistent they are in life. The paper clip strategy suffices. Once you count those clips, you'll realize your progress.
Visual cues have a double effect on your motivation. As evidence of your progress mounts, you become more motivated to stick with the habit. The more clips you put in the box, the more determined you become to do the job. Many behavioural economics studies refer to this condition as the Endowed Progress Effect, which states that we value things more when we own them. In other words, the more clips you move into the empty box, the more important it becomes to maintain this habit.
Visual Cues Boost Your Motivation in Both the Short and Long Term
The paper clip strategy motivates you daily, but you start from scratch. This type of visual stimulation shows you your consistency over the days. You can use it to form a set of visual cues and measure your short- and long-term progress.
Make Your Own Paper Clip Strategy
There are many ways to make this strategy work for your goals:
- Do you want to do 100 push-ups a day? Start with no more than ten clips. Move one of them every time you complete one set. Try to do ten sets every day.
- Do you want to send 25 sales emails every day? Start with 25 clips. Move one of them to the other side each time you press the send button.
- Do you want to drink eight glasses of water a day? Put eight paper clips and pull them out one by one after you finish drinking each glass.
- Not sure if you take your medication three times a day? Place three clips and remove one after each pill.
Best of all, this experience will not cost you a lot of money.
Trent Dyrsmid has discovered that success in his field comes with a core mission: making more sales calls and mastering the principles and fundamentals that make the difference. This also applies to your goals. There are no magic solutions you can resort to, but beneficial habits create the magic.
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