Growing up, books cluttered every corner of the house. They would stack on top of each other, sometimes switch places for no reason at all — like furniture or ornaments. As a lazy reader, I’d always pick out the thinner books, the easily skimmed ones. There’s this one book called “Great People Who Moved the World,” which I would often go back to.
It’s a little book that contains mini-biographies of history’s greats. Amongst the stories were quotes from the people who made it to the list. One quote from Gandhi was a favorite:
“Nearly everything you do is of no importance, but it is important that you do it.”
This one stuck with me.
The younger — more idealistic — version of me focused on the second part of that sentence, maybe because it felt quite empowering.
“It’s important that you do it.”
What we do matters, no matter how small. Idealistic, but I still believe it to be true.
Nowadays, however, I find solace in the first half of that quote. Almost everything we do doesn’t really mean much. This is also true. And thank goodness for that.
Psychology teaches us about the spotlight bias. We’re all prone to falling trap to this from time to time. We think that everyone else is thinking about us in the same frequency and gravity that we think of ourselves. We think everyone is in possession of a highlight reel of all our successes — and failures. On nights when I have trouble sleeping, the montage of all my failed public speeches and social interactions still plays on my mental flatscreen.
In reality, no one sees it as clearly as we do; everyone’s too busy thinking about themselves. The truth is, no one cares, at least not as much as we do. And what a freeing fact that is.
“But it is important that you do it.”
Right, because everything adds up.
It’s not one decision that takes us from where we are to where we want to be. It’s not one choice that makes the whole story, but a series of tiny choices. Choices lead to more choices, and good choices — that is, good based on our own standards and value systems — lead to better ones.
I think, if Gandhi was telling us anything, it might be that our actions mean little on their own, but mean everything as part of the entirety of all our actions. I think of the little screws in the hinges of my glasses. What a nightmare would it be if they were to suddenly disappear. They’re tiny — on their own, insignificant. But as parts of the whole, essential.
Similarly, showing up — to the gym, to work, to school, to your friends — today is one thing. But then we do it again tomorrow and the next day. 100 days of consistency are only made up of individual days, one after the other.
In the end, it’s really about the very first choice, which is likely the smallest, but arguably the most important. In the beginning, “the earth was without form and void, and darkness was over the face of the deep.” Even God, when creating the universe, had to begin with day one.
It’s that first little step that defies inertia. Momentum literally begins here. Any product or energy that is created as a result, owes its existence to that first choice.
“Nearly everything you do is of no importance, but it is important that you do it.”