This week I have been thinking about eating a car. The idea is that however impossible something seems — whether it’s eating a car or completing a massively overwhelming project — you can do it if you break it into small enough chunks over a large enough period.
My problem with this metaphor is that I really wouldn’t know about how to go about eating the car. Where would I store it? How would I break it into small enough chunks? Aren’t the paints toxic? I think my revulsion would make me eat only a microscopic piece of the car, so little that it would take me decades to eat the thing. You would have to really want to eat that car.
Isn’t there a better way to describe this ability to do big projects without being overwhelmed? Perhaps it is better to not think about the revolting enormity of the project at all. Instead, have a mind like water, a mind like the sea, which flows and erodes silently, whilst going about its business. This is akin to Kaizen, the Japanese word for continual improvement, whereby you make small adjustments to your practice rather than starting anew.
It is rare in web design to actually make slow, small, gradual improvements to your site. Far easier to just rip up the stylesheet and start again. The only sites I can think of which have emphasised continual improvement are Daring Fireball and Kottke.org, both of which look fantastic. Wouldn’t the web be a far better place if people followed their lead?
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