How to Eat an Elephant . . . or, tackle any other project.

“By the yard it’s hard, by the inch it’s a cinch”, “A journey of 10,000 miles begins with a single step”, “the sooner you start the sooner you will finish”. Sometimes we just need to be reminded of things we already know, principles we were taught in our youth by those old people like our parents and grandparents, our aunts and our uncles, our wise teachers and mentors.

When we think about tackling a new project, especially one we have never done, the task may seem overwhelming and impossible at first. It is very easy to become trapped in the “paralysis of analysis”. So, I’m going to give you a strategy which should help you accomplish anything you set your mind to. But first, a word of advice from a million-miler. Knowing where you want to go doesn’t mean you have to know every turn in the road to get there. Many things can only be dealt with as you come to them. It is impossible to anticipate every variation, every issue, and every eventuality. Trust in the brain God gave you to come up with workable solutions as you need them. At the same time, that doesn’t preclude considering the obvious potential roadblocks and addressing them at the planning stage (See my inspiration below).

I often use sequential outlines to help me plan out a new project. I break it down into small manageable pieces. Let’s use a hollow vessel with a delicate ebony finial as our example project. To many people, this could be two impossible projects, so we must tackle them one at a time. First the hollow form and secondly the delicate finial.