Unlock faster progress by raising the floor on your goals, not just pushing for perfection.

Master Coach Craig
January 15, 2025

All of us want to go faster, and there are a lot of people and places trying to sell us the dream of “more progress in less time.” Sadly, most of these promises are just a mirage… but not this one!

What I’m about to share with you is something I learned from a former strongman, turned business coach, Nic Peterson, and it completely transformed the way I approach my goals. 

Where Most People Go Wrong

Before I share this approach, it’s important to understand where most go wrong so you can avoid it. 

Regardless of the goal, nearly everyone follows the same pattern falling short of their targets. Taking the first week of a new diet as an example, it typically looks something like this:

• Monday: Started out excited; nailed the diet at 100%. 
• Tuesday: Kept the excitement going, only one small slip. 90%.
• Wednesday: The reality of the week sets in. 70% day. 
• Thursday: Fueled by regret from the day before this is an all out effort. 90%. 
• Friday: You know how Friday nights go… 60%.
• Saturday: Junk-food hang out time. 50%.
• Sunday: “I’m really going to nail it starting tomorrow!” 40%. 

Does this sound like you? (It’s okay—we’ve all been there.)

What To Do Instead

Here’s the magic: instead of pushing your nearly perfect days to 100% (which I call raising the ceiling) you can focus on not doing as badly as you did on your bad days, or “raising the floor.” 

Think back to when you were in school. If you had a 90 in math but only had a 50 in science, which one would require more work to improve?

Obviously math! The amount of work it takes to go from 90 to 100 is a TON, whereas the extra work you could do to take a 50 to a 60 or 65 is comparatively easy. (This is the same reason beginners gain strength much faster than advanced lifters.)

If we reimagine going into our second week with this mindset, instead of trying to get two extra 100% days, what we could say is, “This week I’m not going to drop below 60% on any of my days!”

Just taking our Saturday and Sunday to 60%, and keeping the rest of the days the same, we would end up with 75.7%. 

If we made 65% our “floor” we would end the week with 77.8%. 

These improvements are better than what we would see if we pushed our 90% days to 100—and IT’S SO MUCH EASIER. 

It can be a very appealing trap to think about how you can do a bit better than your best, but if you focus on just being slightly less bad than your previous performance, you’ll make faster progress and you’ll make it with less effort and struggle. 

I would strongly encourage you to look at your goals, and your plans, and see where you can start raising the floor. It’s counterintuitive, but once you experience the difference you’ll never go back to looking at progress any other way!