Consistent Effort Over Time

"I tried it. It didn't work."

What did you do?

"I did the thing."

Ok. What happened?

"I didn't get any results."

How many times did you do the thing?

"Once."

[Sound of me biting my tongue so hard it crunches...]

You can't try something once, suck at it, and claim it doesn't work. And we all suck at something when we're new at it.

Does one pushup work? One healthy meal? Ask one girl out?

There are lots of great and valid tactics out there that if misused or not executed consistently and strategically over time...well, you get it.

"I tried lifting weights once, but they were so heavy."
~ Stevie Ray Fromstein

It takes work. Consistently, over time. And by “it,” I mean anything worthwhile.

If you've put in enough consistent time and effort, if you have enough data to show that it's not working, or not nearly as well as it should, then it's time to move on, iterate, change the tactic, and collect more data. Don't beat your head against a wall.

Sir James Dyson didn't "give it a go," he gave it 5,127 goes.

Sir James Dyson, inventor of the vacuum of the same name, worked 15 years and devised, built, tested, and iterated 5,127 prototypes before he had the product right.

Not once. And not one prototype tested 5,000 times.

Persistence, with purposeful experimentation, using as scientific a method as possible. Dyson changed one small thing on each iteration, which controlled for all other variables. He tested, collected data, then changed another small thing. Tested. Collected data....

Try hard. Fail fast. Move on. Try again. And again, and again, and again, and...