The Small Details Matter Most

By Carl Woolston

Wouldn’t it be nice if every time you had a goal you could just fast forward through all of the steps necessary to accomplish that goal and be done with it?

Adam Sandler portrays an example of this type of thinking in his movie Click, where he simply fast forwards through all the mundane parts of his life to accomplish what he has deemed important.

Sounds nice right? Maybe not.

In the end, Sandler’s character realizes that in fast forwarding and skipping past all these small details in his life, he has completely missed everything that was ultimately important to him.

Life is not made up of a few grand experiences or accomplishments. It is the compilation of all of the smaller details that create these greater things.

Glossing over the details and simply going through the motions is to adopt the view that every day and every action are not important.

With an outlook like that it is hard to imagine anyone having enough passion to strive toward greater accomplishments. 

With that viewpoint, as the details within these projects become more mundane, they will likely fall by the wayside as another great vision that was left uncompleted.

In The Master of Destiny James Allen notes:

“The majority of those who fail and come to grief do so through neglecting the apparently insignificant details. It is a common error to suppose that little things can be passed by, and that the greater things are more important and should receive all attention; but a cursory glance at the universe, as well as a little serious reflection on life, will teach the lesson that nothing great can exist which is not made up of small details and in the composition of which every detail is perfect.”

Isn’t it that way in the aspects of life, whether in business, or in personal matters, or within our families? It will always take vision and a pursuit of that vision in order to achieve successes. But that is only the first step.

The steps that follow will be the difference between success and failure. It’s the attention to detail that can turn the tide.

Details without vision are monotony and vision without follow-through is chaos.