Compounding

Compounding describes growth where each period builds on the full prior balance—not just on the original amount. In habits, skills and capital, steady inputs produce accelerating totals over long horizons.

It is the constructive mirror of present bias: the future payoff feels distant, so the daily contribution looks optional—until the curve steepens. Delayed gratification and boring consistency beat heroic spikes.

Practically: protect a few non-negotiable reps (maintenance routine), track leading indicators in a feedback loop and avoid erasing gains with chronic context switching (context switching). The Pareto principle helps choose which compounding streams matter most.