Small Steps

I enjoyed Amy’s post on Small Steps. There are so many areas of life where small steps add up to achievement. I like the saying “How did the mouse eat the elephant? One bite at a time.” I don’t know its source, but it has stuck in my mind. I kept thinking of this when I was working toward my degree. Whether the task is sewing a quilt, completing a course of study, learning to cook well, or understanding the whole of God’s Word well, if I look at the whole it can be overwhelming. There is a temptation to give up before starting. Yet if I just “do the next thing”, as Elizabeth Elliot says, that seems attainable. Gradually, all those small steps add up to a whole that means the achievement of the original goal. Small steps are especially important for me because of my back problem, which means I often have to break a task into chunks to be able to complete it. To cook a recipe, for example, I usually have to make part of it and then sit down before completing more. If you have a goal, it is better to do a small thing toward it than to do nothing.

Here is nephew 2 taking his own small steps: