Do Small Things Greatly
Have you ever given up something after a little while because you felt no result was showing? I know I have.
We always take into consideration the big things and believe those are the ones the matter.However, as said Napoleon Hill, author of “Think and Grow Rich” (that I am currently listening to):
“If you cannot do great things, do small things in a great way.”
Let’s also take into account a quote from Van Gogh:
“Great things are done by a series of small things brought together.”
Those two quotes combined insist on the importance of small things.
Indeed, if we take the example of a relationship, most times, when it breaks, it isn’t because of some big action done or not, it ends up being a combination of a lot of little ones. One the other hand, one works well when both parties take care and notice the small things done by the other. A simple “You look beautiful today.” can change the world once at a time.
The same action/reaction happens with teeth. While brushing our teeth is a small action we do daily, if we do not do it for a while, big problems occur and we end up with cavities or worse.
This is why we need to focus on those small things and work hard on them day after day. By doing those well, they will merge into something extraordinary that we may have not even been able to imagine at the beginning.
Learning a language seems to me like the perfect instance for this. Instead of spending hours and hours on studying at a time, results show after studying a bit every single day. Learning a few words here, a new grammar point there, etc. will prove to pile up and give you the real skills needed to speak a new language.
It is only at the beginning that we imagine that big actions are important, but when we reach the top, we realize we got there thanks to small actions.
Or as Gilbert K. Chesterton said:
“One sees great things from the valley; only small things from the peak.”
