Every journey starts with a single step
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Crappy advice you find on LinkedIn™
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Every journey starts with one step
- An inch is better than a mile in the wrong direction
- —Bill Wyman, New Fashion, 1982[1]
- Oh, the grand old Duke of York —
- He had ten thousand men:
- He marched them up to the top of the hill,
- And he marched them down again.
- —Traditional
It is hard to unpeel any truism without the lesson it promises evaporating before your eyes, and this one is no different: unless offered to support the contention that any movement is better than none — good advice for sharks, we gather — intoning that every journey starts with one step will only wear shoe leather. Especially if, like the JC, you’re in the habit of setting out even for fruitful destinations without your wallet or a sensible carrier bag.
In any case, it isn’t deciding to set off that’s the trick, but where to. Journeys to the dentist, to visit the mother-in-law, or to back into the spare room to look for the car keys for the fourth time today all start with one step as assuredly as do pilgrimages, holy wars and ascensions of an Olympic dais.
If your only guide to action is to take some, without pausing to assess its likely wisdom, expect to spend more time than you need walking away from spicy opportunities, and dropping through open manhole covers.
References
- ↑ Okay, not the greatest motivational guru I grant you and in fact he said, “an inch is better than a mile in the right direction”, which makes no sense at all, and even less in the context of a completely barking mad lyric.