Every Friday, I share concise, actionable insights for growing your business, optimizing your time, and expanding your mindset. Co-author of multiple million-copy bestsellers.
25 First Downs (2 Min Read) | Vol. 222
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PSA: If you missed my announcement about changes to The ONE Thing, click here. September 25, 2026 | Read Online “The score takes care of itself.” – Bill Walsh 25 First Downs Last week I had Coach Jordan Freed on the podcast, and he hit me with a pop quiz. Me: "Eight." Jordan: "That's a touchdown and the two-point conversion, right? So how many possessions is he down?" Me: "Three. No — four." I did the math out loud and still got it wrong on the first try. Four possessions. Not 25 points. Four possessions. Here's the point Jordan was making. Twenty-five points is a feeling. Four possessions is a plan. One of them you marinate in. The other one you can actually run. Brady took it one possession at a time. He drove the ball down the field and scored. Then he got the ball back and did it again. That's a strange way to coach a team. It's a great way to run a business. In The ONE Thing, we call this thinking “Goal Setting to the Now.” To take effective action, we have to break down the big goals into manageable milestones. A possession is too big to manage on a Tuesday morning. A first down isn't. A first down is the small, repeatable thing you can actually count this week. In real estate, it's listings. Jordan has never coached an agent who hit their listing number every single month and missed the rest of their goals. You have a version of that. Demos booked. Proposals sent. Chapters drafted. Conversations had. It's the one number that makes everything downstream predictable. So the work isn't figuring out how to score 25 points before December 31st. The work is naming your first down. Then getting one. Then getting another. Thirteen weeks left. That's your quarter. One question to ponder in your thinking time: If I'm behind, how many possessions is it really? Make an Impact! Not subscribed? Become a Twenty Percenter here. |
Jay Papasan
Every Friday, I share concise, actionable insights for growing your business, optimizing your time, and expanding your mindset. Co-author of multiple million-copy bestsellers.
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