One Big Win is an online program for helping you to achieve personal goals, and to achieve them now -- without waiting for a "better time" that will never come.
In One Big Win, you'll achieve a major personal victory in eight weeks, by following a simple template made of small, easy steps.
You slip these little steps into your existing lifestyle, wherever they fit.
You choose a goal. We show you the route through the woods.
People have used the One Big Win program to do things like:
Start, or finish, their novel, album, or other creative work
Declutter their household
Get their financial stuff in order once and for all
Learn a musical instrument, language, or software application
Finish renovations
Read great works like Shakespeare or Tolstoy
Set up their website, small business, or YouTube channel
You could probably think of a hundred things you'd do if busyness wasn't holding you back.
You can achieve big wins like these in a relatively short time, without disrupting your life, by doing them in small, easy steps we call Blocks. (See below)
~Shazade J.
I designed One Big Win for people like me: someone with big ideas who has trouble following them through to the end. I'm a serious procrastinator with ADHD, which makes it really hard to make big things happen without structure.
Today, basically everybody is overscheduled, mentally scattered, and technology-addled. We need a way to focus our energies on what matters to us, despite the craziness of modern life.
That's what OBW is.
One Big Win is perfect for you if:
You set goals but rarely finish them, or maybe you've stopped setting them altogether.
You've got a backlog of projects you never seem to have time for.
You have ADHD or procrastination issues, making it hard to plan and achieve goals.
You know you're getting older, and you're tired of waiting to do all the cool stuff.
Basically, One Big Win is for the person who knows they have great things locked up in them, and wants to make them real.
A complete, step-by-step program for achieving life-changing goals.
Get a major personal win under your belt in a matter of weeks. Repeat as desired.
Big projects are overwhelming to think about. The One Big Win system is designed to eliminate confusion about what to do next.
Your only job is to take the next step, and the next step is always clear.
We make big, rewarding projects into small, predicable steps using the Block Method.
Here's how it works:
A Block is a small, uniform chunk of focused work.
Even a single Block represents a lot of power. If you can make a Block, you can do almost anything.
We'll teach you to make Blocks on Day One.
A single Block -- 25 minutes of focused effort -- is easy to make once you've done it a few times.
Just one is enough to knock off any small task, or move a major task one big step forward.
Blocks are building materials for your best life. Virtually anything can be built from some number of Blocks: skills, achievements, creative works, even degrees, businesses, and fortunes.
Eight or ten Blocks on an important project can knock it out of the park.
A hundred Blocks can begin a new chapter in your life.
A typical One Big Win project (we like to call them "quests") takes between 25 and 100 Blocks.
That's 3 to 12 Blocks per week.
One Block takes less than a half hour to make. So you could do a nice 25-Block project in short weekly sessions each Sunday morning.
Or you could do a huge 100+ Block project by doing two Blocks a day.
You decide what your Block budget is, and choose an appropriate quest for that budget.
This is why the Block Method is so powerful. It's a simple and flexible way to achieve goals of any size.
One Big Win student
Here's where it gets crazy powerful.
If you can make a Block, you can pull off a big win in eight weeks.
And if you can pull off one big win, you can do another, and another.
By crushing big wins like this, you could build a company, master a skill, build an audience, make great creative works -- anything you want to build into your life.
Whatever it is you want to do, OBW turns it into a manageable step-by-step process.
The next eight weeks will go by anyway. You can have something amazing to show for it, and learn a formula for achieving wins like that for the rest of your life.
Get a major personal win under your belt in a matter of weeks. Repeat as desired.
Registration is currently OPEN. Spaces are limited.
Sandra, Dallas TX
Your Big Win (aka "quest") can be anything you like, as long as it is personally rewarding, and depends on your own efforts (rather than luck or external factors).
Past OBW students have finished their memoirs, decluttered their homes, learned Photoshop, sold all the stuff in their attic, finalized their retirement plans, read stacks of books, learned programming languages, and much more.
After completing your first Big Win, you can take on another quest and use the same process. You can keep knocking off goals like this for the rest of your life.
You do not need to have a goal in mind before beginning One Big Win. Selecting a suitable project you'd enjoy is part of the course.
A new group cohort is beginning their eight-week goal period between November 3rd and 17th, 2025.
You can join this group, by starting sometime in that window, or you can select your own start date. But you do have limited time to sign up.
The course consists of a sequence of lessons, each only a few minutes long. Simply begin at the first lesson and "follow the road" to conceive, plan, and execute your big win.
After completing your first big win, you can use the same process to complete future goals.
There's also a discussion forum, where you can share your plans and progress, get help, and make friends.
Exactly! None of us have "spare" time. We're already using all 24 hours.
That's why we need a way to work on important, life-changing goals now, while we're still living our normal, busy lives.
One Big Win is a system designed specifically for achieving the stuff that matters without waiting for that mythical "better time" to arrive.
If you can do even three to four Blocks a week -- which could be done in just half a Sunday morning, or over a few lunch hours -- you can achieve a major personal win in eight weeks.
Yes, you can start the course later than the November 3-17 group start window if you like.
However, you probably don't need to. One Big Win is all about using the Block Method to get big things done even with a "full" schedule. You probably don't need to wait for a better time.
We also offer simple ways to accommodate holiday obligations (such as Thanksgiving or Christmas) so that you can focus on whatever you need to.
No.
One Big Win was originally made for readers of the How to Do Things ebook, which explains the Block Method and how to use it.
However, How to Do Things is so short and concise that you can read it in about an hour, and implement its signature Block Method right away. A reference copy is included with the course.
"The biggest take away for me was learning what can be done in 8 weeks. The short time frame and the concept of 'always be closing' has done wonders for my self esteem. Following the course step by step, block by block can help kill the overwhelm and dread about a big workload ahead. It is so simple, yet without this course to follow, I could never have arrived at this roadmap myself."
Frankfurt, GER
"Just try it. Trust the process. You’re already considering it because everything else you’ve tried hasn’t worked. And this could very well be the one that does. It has been for me."
Toronto, ON
"I’ve gotten more done in the past 8 weeks than I probably would have done in the next 4-6 months, and of much higher quality because it wasn’t thrown together last minute. My students have seen and commented on the difference in my classes, and that’s all the confirmation I need to know this is how I will continue working."
Halifax, NS
"This course was so eye-opening! I discovered a fun, new effective way to get things done. And it helped me better see what my priorities really are. Excellent learning experience!"
"I don’t feel stressed looking at my list of projects now. It is all possible. I can see a start, a middle, and an end. I’ve read so many books on willpower, how to overcome procrastination, how to be organised… nothing worked until this program. That feeling of hope and positivity and confidence and clarity is priceless. I’m starting my second OBW today. Thank you David."
Paris, FRA
"This course helped me achieve a truly life-changing goal (applying to a university graduate program) which I likely would not have done without this structure and motivation. And it was done far ahead of schedule, which is unheard of for me."
Belleville, CAN
At any given time, you’re only about 25 to 100 Blocks away from a huge variety of life-changing achievements.
That's only 3 to 12 Blocks per week.
The possibilities are truly endless. Here are some ideas:
Finish your university thesis, or a big piece of it
Get a major project at work done
Declutter the entire household
Begin your novel and get the first two chapters done
Learn to play the guitar solo in Stairway to Heaven
Install You Need a Budget (or a similar app) and get yourself using it
Write a novella
Read a long classic, or several of them. (e.g. The Lord of the Rings, War and Peace, Jane Austen’s big three, Don Quixote, Ulysses.)
Organize all your photos
Start a Dungeons & Dragons campaign
Get 40 hours of meditation under your belt
Educate yourself on [Topic X] so that you’re able to discuss [Topic X] confidently
Get a certification, for work or for fun
Learn the basics of mobile app design, audio engineering, CSS, or any other technical skillset
Learn to code
Read the essential “canon” in some topic area (top 5 personal finance books, top 3 books about A.I., etc)
Deep dive into a person you admire, consuming their work and a biography or two
Learn to assemble your family tree on ancestry.com, or elsewhere
Prepare your will
Launch a YouTube channel and make your first three videos
Read the Bible, or study some of its books deeply
Learn everything you need to know in order to hike the Pacific Northwest Trail next year
Knock off a long list of small, long-ignored tasks
Make a quilt
Go through everything in the attic or garage
Write three short stories
Record an album
Get all your inboxes to zero
Learn to use ChatGPT, Midjourney, or another A.I. tool skillfully
Deep clean: list everything that’s really dirty – under the stove, the back foyer walls, etc, and get all of it sparkling
Write down all your burning questions about a particular topic (e.g. personal finance, computing, politics) and look up the answers
Go through all your filing cabinets so that you know where every document is
Cull all your online feeds, bookmarks, and to-read lists: Substack, Twitter, Instagram, etc, or unfollow everyone and start from scratch
Learn how to properly service your vehicle, and establish a clear maintenance schedule
Start an online business
Come up with a principled, well-researched position on a tricky political or moral issue
Learn some yoga, qi gong, or tai chi routines by heart, so that you can do them anywhere and any time
Learn to draw, using a book like Drawing on the Right Side of the Brain
Learn to use a sewing machine and do a few projects
Learn to cook three or four go-to dishes well enough that they would impress most people
Assemble and print a family cookbook
Start a zine and distribute the first issue
Make a list of people you want to reconnect with, and reach out to them
Learn the BBC’s "25 skills every cook should know"
Deal with your storage locker: clean it out, quit paying every month, and sell everything you don’t want
Build a patio, shed, or fence
KonMari (i.e. declutter item-by-item) the entire household
Write the screenplay you’ve had in your mind for years
Design and publish an online course
Do the CBT workbook your therapist gave you but which you stuck in a drawer
Implement David Allen’s GTD system, or some other workflow system
Look up a list of things you feel like you should know but just don’t (What are the three branches of government? What are you supposed to do when you encounter a bear?)
Learn Adobe Photoshop or some other software
Start a podcast
Figure out how to back up your computer regularly and stop worrying about losing everything
List everything broken in your home and fix it, replace it, or get rid of it
Learn the basics of photography
Learn a list of minor skills you admire, such as: wrap a present neatly, pour a beer perfectly, jump rope without constantly stopping, jump start a car, shuffle cards, parallel park, do magic tricks, etc.
Of course, you may already have something in mind.
You also don't need to know how to achieve your goal eight weeks. That's all part of the program.
For now, just imagine the possibilities. What would your life be like if you could just pull off this One Big Win? In less than two months, it can be real.
You can then use this method to knock off goal after goal. You can build anything you want this way, and we can show you how.