Don’t measure how far you are from the top. Measure how far you are from the bed you couldn’t get out of.

Distance from the goal is an inexhaustible supply of bad news, because there is always more of it and it tells you nothing about whether you are moving. Measured from the worst point instead, the same situation reads as progress. Both numbers are real. Only one of them helps you do anything tomorrow.

Remember where you actually started, in detail, and write it down somewhere you will see it. When you feel like nothing is happening, compare today against that rather than against the finish. Keep the goal as a direction and let the backwards measurement be the one you check.